Dream Nails
You Wish
You Wish is Dream Nails bassist Mimi Jasson’s debut providing lead vocals as well as rhythm, also being the band’s third singer in as many albums. That’s notable, though not in an inherently negative, ‘can’t hold down a frontperson’ sort of way. It shows an adaptability that, after being around for more than a decade, is a good quality for Dream Nails to have. Not just in reshuffling personnel, either, but in the way their output has similarly undergone craft changes. You Wish inhabits the intersection of Americanised indie-punk and of-the-moment post-punk, chiselling at previous brusque edges to get a more detailed, less obvious shape.
The pugnacious core remains, however, as it should. The wherewithal to drive forward against oppressive and harmful systems has always been Dream Nails’ M.O., and although it takes a different form on You Wish, the base aspects remain. In a world that’s profoundly, overwhelmingly exhausting, human growth and understanding can feel like a revelation. As guitarist Anya Pearson puts it, it’s “walking a tightrope between the personal and the surreal”, where the writing is more open-ended than ever but not unfocused or slapdash. Despite the looming monstrosity of AI addressed through panic and rage on Organoid, there’s something to said for outward humanity upheld on The Spirit Does Not Burn and House Of Bones. It might feel futile at a glance, but the sentiment is spelled out plainly.
Likewise, the music on You Wish is untainted by modern concessions or over-polish. This direction—a thick selection of basslines at the fore, held up by ramshackle yet real alt-rock production—was in Dream Nails’ wheelhouse already, after all. Now, though, it’s reconfigured into riffy monuments like The Spirit Doesn’t Burn and Move Like An Animal. By contrast, This Is Water and Can’t Lose could do with added guitar muscle, just so that side of the band doesn’t feel as comparatively atrophied. Nevertheless, You Wish shows off a tight, impressive musical core that Dream Nails do a lot with. Even if its sharpest turns are shelved until the very end—the tappy, trumpet-accented Zeros and the lush ‘90s throwback A Sign—it never feels less-well-built for it.
That’s been a strength of Dream Nails since the beginning, and now holds on as tenaciously as they themselves do. You Wish, as a product of personal, musical and band-centric growth, is the sort of wholeheartedly admirable step that it’s always great to see embraced, not shied away from. It’d honestly be a shame if something pretty big doesn’t come from this one; Dream Nails now seem totally on the right post-punk path for it. If it was Cameron Winter going on an aside about getting life advice from a horse, it’d be the stuff of RateYourMusic legend instantly.
For fans of: THICK, Gully Boys, Lambrini Girls
‘You Wish’ by Dream Nails is released on 6th February on Marshall Records.
Remember Sports
The Refrigerator
Something you’ll have undoubtedly noticed about the whole indie-punk / emo / alt-punk conglom is that a) it has a high floor, and b) the best bands are the ones who can take advantage of that. That’s Remember Sports to a T. They’re now up to their fifth album, riding on a career that’s not terribly different in trajectory from a lot of their peers but does so well with everything required of it. The Refrigerator at its best has everything you need—warm, rugged emo (Across The Line and Cut Fruit); rough-and-tumble pop-punk (Bug and Thumb); and ground-level indie-rock’s shorthand for charm and likability.
It’s done about as well as you’d want and expect, clearly drawing on the confidence and aptitude that’s gotten Remember Sports five albums deep. Yeah, the slowdown between Selfish and Roadkill can be felt (no matter how steady it is), but especially on Ghost that adorns itself with bagpipes, jangly acoustics and torn-up strings, it’s not a gearshift with no purpose. Between some Americana influences and Carmen Perry’s pseudo-yodel, it’s a good frame for explorations of self-doubt and nonlinear healing. The touches of country music at the fringes aren’t quite as coincidental or a symptom of the style as they may appear.
To an extent, it’s not like any of that proclaims a newness, though you also get the impression that Remember Sports aren’t trying to. There’s a reason that emo and indie-rock like this has become the go-to of individuals working through insular yet relatable emotions, and this is another strong example of that. Not a new peak, but expecting that is far out of the question. Instead, seeing The Refrigerator for what it is—another exemplary cut of this style—is more than enough.
For fans of: The Menzingers, illuminati hotties, Cayetana
‘The Refrigerator’ by Remember Sports is released on 13th February on Get Better Records.
congratulations
Join Hands
We were so close. congratulations almost had it—a solid sound; a fun live show; a colourful, eye-catching dress sense like indie-punk’s answer to The Wiggles. But apparently, in the interim between 2024’s Slap EP and now, someone developed a vendetta against the concept of breathable space. Hence, we get the mutated debut full-length Join Hands, chock-a-block with awkward, uncomfortable, frequently unpleasant musical choice that leave it choked at almost every turn.
There’s a litany of choices made where any logic behind them is just imperceptible. Join Hands is a clearer pivot to pop-rock, but that doesn’t necessitate the buzzing, shredded guitars and production packed in like the musical equivalent of clogged arteries. A song like This Life requires a melody to be dissected from its closed, abrasive form; just one track later, Dr. Doctor sees fit to add its clattering drums to the existing cacophony of whirs, thumps and beeps. All the while, there’s an upbeat sensibility forcibly seared in, like a bout of Smash Mouth-esque zaniness that’s been further irradiated.
The sad thing is that congratulations do seem to have a clue of how to work this that only sparingly shows up. The one-two of Fought 4 Love and My Hair is what this is all supposed to be, as the freewheeling lyrical style meshes with the vibe of hyper-saturated pop-rock from the late ‘90s and very early 2000s. Unfortunately, they’re the minority of cases. Join Hands stands out most through bewilderment and frustration, chiefly in how the horrid hyper-pop stab Johnny Hands got past any sort of preliminary stage. And for a band who could’ve been a real beacon of light for their scene, that’s an utter shame. congratulations do still have some of that on here; you just have to pull away, like, more than half of the album to reach it.
For fans of: Home Counties, Courting, Thumper
‘Join Hands’ by congratulations is released on 13th February on Bella Union.
Words by Luke Nuttall
