The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
Every Tuesday, the Sounding Board is a space for a short-ish review of a recent-ish release and conversations about new-to-you music. We’ll get things started with a write-up about a newer, likely under-heard album, and invite you to share your music musings in the comments.
Some vetting is required before inviting someone to the Bug Club.
Recommending the Welsh project built around the dynamic duo of Sam Willmett and Tilly Harris to someone without having a few details nailed down is simply inadvisable. You should know how the would-be initiate feels about the first couple Beat Happening albums, whether they still spin the first Los Campesinos! LP, if they dance in their car to “Me and the Major” by Belle and Sebastian and — most critically — you should really, really have a firm grasp on their attitude toward the Vaselines.1
The Bug Club occupy a wordy, twee, somewhat abrasive and overtly British sonic niche that could make their fourth LP, Very Human Features, a torturous listen for certain people. However, for the folks who relish a blend of verbose wordplay and nihilistic detachment in lyrics and are always down for melody rendered through adorkable cacophony, Very Human Features is one of the year’s most singularly fun listens.2
If you’re in need of a litmus test for determining whether this album is for you, look no further than “Beep Boop Computers.” I’d count it as one of my favorite songs of the year. I also have to admit it’s easy to squint my ears and hear things that would drive some people crazy, and they’re evident from the track’s opening seconds. A discordant guitar kerrang cracks the song open, and Willmett’s and Harris’ voices immediately leak out to deliver the lines “Your light shines brighter than a million second Suns/ That doesn’t mean a single thing to anyone/ And all the beep boop computers knew you wouldn’t last the night” in fricative near-unison.
The almost simultaneous delivery isn’t unique to “Beep Boop Computers.” It’s how a lot of the lyrics, maybe even most of the lyrics, on Very Human Features are delivered. Regardless of point of view or gender, there’s a good chance that the Bug Club’s members are buzzing the words as a hive mind. The blissfully petulant “Jealous Boy” exemplifies this commitment to genderless merged identity as both Willmett and Harris seethe “I’m not allowed to be the jealous boy I am” with enough edge to cut through the accompanying blasts of chunky guitar.3 This atonality is obviously intentional because when Willmett or Harris assume solo vocal duties, they each prove to have fine voices that could credibly lead a band. Willmett tends to sing with droll detachment that recalls Ray Davies or Will Toledo and fits with the Bug Club’s humorous lyrics. Wilmett also uncorks the occasional chaotic yip that has no neat analog. Harris has a richer, smoother voice that falls somewhere between Aleks Campesinos! and Courtney Barnett. It’s a ton of fun to hear them bray together, but it’s a big choice when either one could carry a song, or they could try out more traditional harmonies.
“Beep Boop Computer” contains multitudes, as it also shows the band’s more tuneful side. After its opening verse, Willmett deploys a churning surf riff while singing “But I’m too tired for feeling/ I’m not wired for healing/ I’m not sure I’m even/ Speaking the language you’re hearing,” as Harris provides “oohie-ooh” backing vocals. It’s a bang-on imitation of Jan and Dean-era rock music that doesn’t sound exactly like anything else on the album. It also doesn’t seem out of place on Very Human Features. While the surf-rock is a one-off, the chops that make it possible aren’t. Willmett can use his guitar to spark pyrotechnics, generate silly sounds or setting a contemplative tone. Harris’ bass is a steady throbbing presence that occasionally bursts to the surface. It playfully pushes songs forward and provides space for Willmett to style. Everything sounds good and anything sounds plausible.
That means Very Human Features has room for a song titled “When the Little Choo Choo Train Toots His Little Horn,” which is mostly as bright and childlike as you’d imagine; “Young Reader,” which is much more pointed than you’d imagine and ends with the sentiment “you don’t have to live a life like this/ you could just die”; and the meta chaos of “Twirling in the Middle,” which calls out an in-progress tempo change by repeating the words “rock steady” eight times before predicting the silly solos that wrap up the song. In context, it doesn’t feel weird that the album’s title track “Muck (Very Human Features)” is a soft, melancholic song built around a refrain of “run little child,” it’s just more extremely listenable zaniness bobbing along the undercurrent of unease that runs through Very Human Features.
In fact, provided you have the right — or maybe wrong — tastes Extremely Listenable Zaniness would make a fine alternate title for this LP.
About the writer
Ben Hohenstatt
Ben Hohenstatt is an Alaska-based dog owner who moonlights as a music writer and photographer.
For more information, consult your local library or with parental permission visit his website.
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The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
Violent Femmes is an album that unreservedly exorcises teenage demons while simultaneously recognizing their inherent darkness.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
Department of
Conversation
This is an incredibly well-timed review, since I was just listening to “How to Be a Confidante” on the way into work this morning. (And then singing it under my breath as I got my office set up for the day.) Great review, and I need to check out the full album for all the Extremely Listenable Zaniness.
What did we watch?
The Kids In The Hall, Season Three, Episode Nine
– The first sketch leading immediately into a Police Department sketch is a very Mr Show moment.
– “And now, I would like to introduce my lovely assistant, Kevin Macdonald, who is dressed this way for a cheap laugh.”
– “Well, remember that the essence of good storytelling is embelleshment.”
– “Okay, Kevin, I think we’re losing the crowd, could you please show them your bum?”
– “I’ve been going to school on the night shift.”
– “I’ll do your taxes if you have twenty minutes.”
– “Do you know what happens when a science teacher falls and hits his head on the curb?” / “No, what?” / “He becomes a janitor.”
– “Cliches are so important in a phony world.”
– Nath and I had a conversation about Buddy as the best skit character to not get a movie, and now I’m thinking, if he had one, it would be a ninety minute monologue.
– “If you’re gay and our eyes meet, it’s message received.”
– “Suffice to say, I ate a lot of figs that summer.”
Kojak, “Mouse” – The titular mouse is a CPA angry over his mother’s death during unnecessary surgery, so angry that he… he doesn’t let insurance pay the bill! But when the doctor – who needs the money to pay gambling debts – sics his bookie’s goon on the mouse, the mouse breaks the goon’s kneecaps. One part character study of this not-so-meek man, one part Kojak putting the pieces together and trying to find a way to see justice done without ruining the man’s life, and one part morality play about the dangers of gambling. Which in the age of legalized gambling feels both quaint and prescient.
Frasier, “My Imaginary Girlfriend” – At the end of last season, Frasier went to Acapulco spontaneously with a woman he met at the airport. I have no idea if the writers planned to follow on that at the start of season five, but we pick on the plane. Where the woman instantly rejected Frasier but when he meets a supermodel who is also studying for her PhD. He has a fling, but as she is not ready to go public with her ongoing breakup, Frasier has to keep their fling secret. But when he can’t keep his mouth shut, no one believes him! Of course, Frasier blows it with the model (and since Sela Ward was busy elsewhere, we knew she wasn’t going to be back anyway), and it gets cringey, but there are still a fair number of funny moments. Mostly involving the story of how young Frasier faked being pen pals with Leonard Bernstein.
NBA Finals – As ever, just the first half, but this time I think I got an accurate representation of how things worked out. Lots of Thunder steals and buckets, and Haliburton hurtin. Also, half of Richard Jefferson’s comments were things I was thinking. I hope they keep him.
The X-Files, “Pilot” and “Deep Throat”
“Dedicated agents travel across the country investigating paranormal/otherworldly phenomena” has always been pretty close to my ideal setup for a TV show: process! danger! eerieness! dramatic shots of files! weird Americana! roadside diners and down-at-the-heels motels! It’s about time I watched The X-Files in a more dedicated, less patchwork way.
The pilot manages to be pretty good even though the case-of-the-week is only so-so. Part of that’s because even the lackluster investigation packs in some memorable moments and details–the marks on the abductees’ backs are visibly distinct and just the right degree of uncanny (and the way they lead to the midnight conferral between Mulder and a mosquito-bitten Scully kicks off the duo’s incredible intimacy without feeling too much like an excuse to get Gillian Anderson in her underwear), Mulder’s glee at tracing the missing time back to his spray-painted X is delightful, the white light in the woods has real atmosphere–but a lot of it is just because Anderson and Duchovny are two of the most purely watchable people to ever be on TV.
On that note, one of the most interesting parts of the pilot for me is how swiftly the show discards that could’ve been a fundamental part of its setup: the idea that Scully is supposed to provide evidence to get the X-Files unit shut down. The fact that her reports will be analyzed with particular attention, and that she’s in some official sense there to keep an eye on him, does stay in the picture, but there’s a phantom version of the show where this is all happening without Mulder knowing it, where he only finds out at the worst, most trust-breaking moment. And that would, in some ways, be the traditionally sensible way to do it: the “double-agent” role is (to borrow from Kit Whitfield) narrative capital, and the show “should” invest it until it can spend it at the right moment. The X-Files spends it in their first meeting–Mulder’s too smart not to know what’s happening, and Scully’s too honorable to deceive him–but only so it can surreptitiously invest it elsewhere. Now it’s not, even in the most sympathetic way, Mulder vs. Scully, it’s Mulder and Scully. The project is something they’re mutually aware of and mutually invested in (Mulder even urges a swept-up-in-the-moment Scully to not sound too much like him: she’s the one who will have to sell this in the report). The story becomes less dramatic and more stable, but it also becomes the story of a partnership–and obviously that’s a part of the show people will always remember.
“Deep Throat” is even better, with a top-notch case–this feels partly inspired by The Twilight Zone‘s excellent “And When the Sky Was Opened”–and some even more top-notch paranoia. I love the neighbor whose test pilot husband has also had a breakdown (now spending most of his time silently making fishing flies); even before the most telling moment, the actress does a great job of deftly but not too obviously conveying that she’s been handsomely paid off and is loyal because of it. This is an especially good episode for Duchovny, who nails both Mulder’s conspiracy geek effervescence–he’s waited his whole life for someone to warn him off a case and bug his phone! He may technically be The Man, but he was born to run from armed guards!–and the defeated, vulnerable slump after he’s had his memory tampered with.
But “Deep Throat” still belongs–as its title would imply–to Jerry Hardin, who is an incredible addition, with all the right lines on his face and all the right sense of warm, wry, not-too-invested humor. His line at the end of the episode–delivered over his shoulder, barely breaking his stride–is one of the most iconic episode closers in TV history: “Mr. Mulder, ‘they’ have been here for a long, long time.”
Mulder’s glee at seeing the X he painted on the road is my favourite moment in the pilot and one of my favourite X-Files moments ever – more than anything else, this not only sells that Mulder is a man who Wants To Believe, it makes me want to believe too. Duchovny and Mulder are overjoyed to be discovering this shit, and I want to feel their joy too. Real life conspiracy theorists are often smug and dominating; Mulder is a man who wants to share this stuff with us.
I also appreciate the way the show comfortably played with gender roles; Scully is more obvious, as a woman embodying STEM pursuit of Aristotelian knowledge and authority, but I also love that Mulder is the one with degrees in psychology and sociology, and he’s always so sympathetic, nurturing, and giving to everyone he meets, rarely trying to make people out to be fools because he’s simply too curious about them. There’s an episode where he’s disbelieving of a rape victim, and I dislike it because it doesn’t feel like Mulder would be like that.
Yes, Mulder’s infectious enjoyment of all this really is so key: he’s not a “sheeple” guy but a “wouldn’t this be so cool? And also make you feel better about things?” guy, and that’s a huge difference.
Huge +1 on your second point, too. And now I’m also already offended on Mulder’s behalf re: that particular episode.
I think it helps considerably that he takes Scully and her criticisms 100% seriously; there’s a rather stupid criticism that says Mulder is always right, which is almost never true – sure, there’s always something supernatural happening, but his initial theories are almost always wildly off-base and Scully’s reflexive rationalism forces him to prove his theories and often find he’s at least a bit wrong. He recognises her rational attitude is a necessary corrective to his bullshit, which means recognising he’s capable of bullshit.
Thinking of the episode with Tom Noonan where he’s solo and has to act as his own Scully, wanting to believe but also recognizing when he’s being played (and using a clever trick to prove it).
Your enthusiasm for these 2 episodes really makes me want to rewatch The X-Files. I prefer the monster of the week episodes to the secret government alien conspiracy episodes. Your mention of Gillian Anderson in her underwear is also a motivating factor in my desire to rewatch the series. I was a teenager when this series first aired and I’m surprised that wasn’t a core memory for me.
I’m also a big monster-of-the-week person. I like the alien conspiracy episodes in the moment, but it’s admittedly annoying to know in advance that they’ll build and build but never go anywhere.
And to your Anderson point, I almost had a line in there about “it doesn’t feel like too much of an excuse (not that I mind),” so: relatable.
Tornado – a Scottish samurai movie? Sure, why not. This is the second film by John Maclean, who is also a member of the Beta Band – he directed Slow West a decade ago, I feel like it was reasonably well-liked but didn’t make much of an impression on me. I thought this one was quite a bit better, it’s a really fun attempt to take the tropes of the samurai genre (and by that I mean the pulpier stuff, rather than Kurosawa) and transport it to the scenic Scottish highlands. There’s a simple “bunch of trouble over a little stolen money” premise that basically results in a big chase, a young Japanese woman trying to get away from the local thugs she has opportunistically stolen from. It’s a gorgeous looking film, there are some fun characters (Tim Roth is the most recognisable face as the head of the gang) and once it eventually gets into bloody revenge territory it has some fun with the classic “spray of blood” effect. Nothing too exceptional overall maybe, but a well-executed genre exercise and the Scottish setting definitely gives it something a little different. Two of the people I saw it with HATED it, interestingly. Not a film I would expect to be THAT divisive, but there it is.
I liked Slow West but it’s an agreeably sleepy, dryly funny anti-Western, definitely not an instant classic but closer to Little Big Man than Unforgiven, which means it’s up my alley. Didn’t know he was in the Beta Band!
The Singing Detective Episode 3 – As Freudian as television gets, for better or worse, which is making me confront my personal critique of Freud and the Oedipus complex, namely that it turns the human mind into a neat, easily solvable puzzle, and the limits of that view in and of itself, because some people really are this neurotic about sex and death. I’m curious how I’ll feel once I’m done with all six episodes because I think I’ve gotten a bit more bored with psychoanalytic, “this person’s brain and neuroses can be solved” style writing and enjoy more the post-war England context and how Potter is playing with narrative. The singing detective in question and the central “mystery” is more a parody of a story, and whodunnit doesn’t matter, to the extent that fictional Marlowe is feeding the words to “Lily.”
What did we listen to?
Driving Rain, Paul McCartney
My favourite McCartney yet. His lyrics have become sparse and insightful and honest; his music is hard rock. After all my complaining/observing, this is actually the closest he’s come solo to music that sounds like The Beatles.
Seem to be having trouble finishing some recent Blank Checks. Maybe there is just nothing to say about MI8.
After watching a YouTube channel about the Beatles – Parlogram – note that most stereo versions of Beatles recordings are retrofitted from mono versions and that a lot of deep fans think the mono recordings are better – I listed to the small number of mono tracks on Spotify. I can’t say I hear a huge difference, but going from the usual “dogs racing through your head” at the end of Good Morning Good Morning to essentially hearing race ahead of me is a simple demonstration that some of the stereo tricks being used at the time were really just that.
I listened to enough this week that I stopped keeping notes on it, so these will be short, vibes-based write-ups instead:
The Disintegration Loops, William Basinski
This ambient album of sound gradually but steadily degrading in the transfer to digital was, weirdly enough, exactly what I needed on one worry-filled day last week. It’s the sound of inevitable loss, but in a strangely soothing, universal way? While I was listening to this, I thought a lot about John Crowley’s excellent short story “Snow,” which is no bad thing.
Pet Sounds, The Beach Boys
Revisited for obvious reasons. Gorgeous as ever, and one of the loveliest testaments to someone’s genius imaginable. And “God Only Knows,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “Sloop John B,” “Don’t Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder),” and more.
The Beginning Stages Of…, The Polyphonic Spree
Mellow, pleasant, easy to sink into. Sunny even when there are notes that feel melancholy. The long ambient track at the end turned out to be a highlight because, due to circumstances beyond my control, I wound up listening to it in the car, and driving around while listening to ambient noise music felt like the kind of touch a movie might use to reveal that someone was severely disturbed. This amused me more than it probably should have. (But it’s a good ambient track. You can even sing along to it, in a weird way.)
Short ‘n’ Sweet (Deluxe), Sabrina Carpenter
Really liked this a lot. Tristan is right, “Please Please Please” is the best of the bunch, with a ton of standout lines–“Heartbreak is one thing, my ego’s another” and “I know I have good judgment, I know I have good taste / It’s funny and it’s ironic that only I feel this way”–but I also particularly love “Taste” (so poppy and so vicious), “Sharpest Tool,” “Espresso,” and “Slim Pickins.”
The deluxe edition has a more country version of “Please Please Please” feat. Dolly Parton, which is a very fun variation with one technically sanitized but also poignant lyrical revision: “I beg you, don’t embarrass me, motherfucker” to “I beg you, don’t embarrass me like the others.”
The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, Chappell Roan
Extremely enjoyable and full of life, self-discovery, and raunchiness. Highlights: “Femininomenon” (“Can you play a song with a fucking beat, please?!”), “Red Wine Supernova,” “Casual” (both explicit and poignant, sort of like an R-rated lesbian Taylor Swift), “HOT TO GO!”, “My Kink Is Karma,” and “Pink Pony Club,” with “Casual” and “Pink Pony Club” sharing the gold.
Our Endless Numbered Days, Iron & Wine
An album on Nath’s list that I’ve actually listened to before! I always like Iron & Wine’s lyrics and their thoughtful, slightly twangy sound. “Teeth in the Grass” and “Passing Afternoon” are my old familiar favorites, but there’s really nothing here I don’t like.
Thunder, Lightning, Strike, The Go! Team
Peppy and addictive, and it combines its influences in a way that’s really vivid and winds up feeling original (or at least unique to it). Just very cheerful, and I wound up playing it more than once to just enjoy these particular sounds.
Good Bad Not Evil, Black Lips
Brash and bright. Favorites include “How Do You Tell a Child Someone Has Died,” “O, Katrina!”, and “Bad Kids.” (And credit where credit is due: while the lyrics of “Navajo”–a generic mishmash of American Indian signifiers–don’t work for me at all, the music itself is wildly catchy.)
We Are The Pipettes, The Pipettes
Very bouncy and fun girl group material. I especially loved “Judy,” but “Sex” is also excellent–especially for the “just rest your pretty head” refrain–and so is the exuberantly infatuated “I Love You,” which nails a particular kind of bold simplicity. (All the obvious, cheesy ideas about love feel true and real and moving when you’re discovering them from the inside, and this captures that in a very genuine way.) Strong, likable album.
Fond memories of the Black Lips from that era, esp. “O Katrina!”
Their live shows get very raucous very quickly.
You might be going through the albums on my list faster than I did at the time! (Actually, that might not even be true, which may be the scarier proposition.)
I seem to have taken a week off the 1001 albums thing, although I’ve spent some more time with Curtis Mayfield, Stevie Wonder and (inevitably) Beach Boys albums from earlier in the project.
I’ve also been listening to Subminiature by Hour a lot – Hour are a Philadelphia instrumental band who are a bit too chilled out to be called post-rock I would say, although I’m not sure how else to describe them. This is a live album which is an interesting release for such a low-key band but I think it’s my favourite thing they’ve released yet – the roomy sound suits their stuff so well, and it’s cool how they change the lineup depending on the venue, stripped down traditional rock band instrumental or augmented with woodwind and strings etc. It’s a great album for hot days or for relaxing at night.
https://itshr.bandcamp.com/album/subminiature
Screen Drafts, The Two Coreys – I watched a bunch of Coreys movies with an old housemate years ago and it was fun hearing their careers dissected in draft fashion. Some really leftfield choices at the bottom of the list, and one notable omission, but mostly I was happy that my beloved Lucas made it as high as #2.
You’re not even American and you know way more Philly bands than me.
It does seem to be a music scene that I particularly click with, although the three bands I listen to the most (Friendship, Hour, Second Grade) all share members so maybe it’s mostly just that group of musicians.
Listening to a big Johnny Cash biography by Robert Hillebrand* and accordingly listening to random Cash, especially American Recordings and At Folsom Prison, an electrifying document still of outlaw country and Cash’s Tennessee Two freight train sound at it’s peak. (RIP Luther Perkins.) This is making me want to check out his concept albums which seem like they were ahead of their time as far as seeing records as singular works.
* it is very blackly funny how much, with the book in hand, Walk The Line isn’t just “print the legend” hagiography but also how badly the movie treats Vivian Cash, turning a kind, strong, and loyal to a fault wife and mother into a creature so spiteful and angry at her brilliant, pill-popping musician husband that Walk Hard makes an entire running gag out of her nagging harridan status. “Goodbye, miss you, I know you’re gonna fail!”
In my quest for the best music in 2025, I got two songs that made their case pretty swiftly – Panda Bear’s “Ferry Lady” and Foxwarren’s “Listen2me” – and a couple that took a few listens before getting the stamp of approval, Rocket’s “Take Your Aim” and Great Grandpa’s “Ladybug.”
Blank Check – “Clueless” with Heidi Gardner, noted Kansas Citian – and still current Kansas Citian in the off-season, take note Paul Rudd. So every obscure reference to the area – city geography, longtime film critic Robert Butler, band The Urge – was an Easter Egg just for me. I am going to run into her tiny cart at the Leawood Trader Joe’s and we will become friends. (Also the movie rules and it’s one of the better discussions of a film where everybody pretty much agrees that it rules.)
Year of the Month update!
This June, we’re covering 1983, including all these movies, albums, books, et al!
Jun. 19th: Cameron Ward: Barefoot Gen
Jun. 24th: John Bruni: Legendary Hearts
Jun. 26th: Cameron Ward: Twice Upon a Time
Jun. 30th: Tristan Nankervis: The Big Chill
And next month is 2005, including all these movies, albums, books, et al!
Jul. 28th: Tristan J. Nankervis: Sin City
Bug Club’s tight. Very new wave. I like your list of comparisons. The male-female vocal interplay on “How to Be a Confidante” also had me thinking of the Human League.