Poor People Are Revolting

The Gotobeds hail from Pittsburgh, where they must live in a communal crash pad littered with well-worn copies of Pavement, Fall, Wire, and Sonic Youth LPs, old copies of dog-eared fanzines, and an array of half-broken guitars, guttertaped-together distortion pedals, and cracked cymbals too. Their first album, Poor People Are Revolting, is a well-constructed distillation of the wiry, unsteady noise meets rough-and-ready melodic thrust of their idols, delivered with a very modern degree of snark. It's a nostalgic sound, but the furious energy and cracked-wide-open intensity the band brings to the table make the album come fully alive. The electrical storm the guitars create helps too, as do the very often unhinged vocals of Eli Kasan. When they are really breathing fire, like on the rampaging "To and From" or "Fast Trash," there's a palpable excitement transmitted through the speakers that's impossible to ignore. It should even quell the nagging voice in the listener's head that whispers that it's been done before. Maybe it has, but you can't deny that the Gotobeds unearth the past with a style and vision all their own. To go along with the fist-pumping, shout-along jams that make up the bulk of the album, they mix in some poppier moments (the deliriously catchy "New York's Alright"), some grinding art rockers (the happily messy "Jenna Rations"), and a long guitar freak-out (the 11-minute long "Secs Tape") that prove they have some range. These diversions also plot out various courses the band could pursue on future recordings. It's a great debut that really makes a strong impression and launches the Gotobeds to the same high level of their more hyped Pavement-SY-Fall-worshiping contemporaries like Protomartyr and Parquet Courts. If you are a fan of any or all of the bands previously mentioned, you'll find Poor People Are Revolting well worth checking out.