Superchunk – ‘Songs In The Key Of Yikes’ album review: Is this what rebellion sounds like?
Feeling something is a difficult task in the modern day.
We are chronically digitalised and seemingly desensitised to the myriad of societal shit that takes place on any corner of the globe. In dark times, we turn to music, and sometimes in that darkness, music that reminds us of a blissfully simple place. Superchunk are giving it a good go at asking you if good old-fashioned guitar hooks can cut through and make you feel that very something.
Superchunk’s 2018 record, What A Time To Be Alive, was a direct response to the first Donald Trump presidency, and upon his re-election, the band felt compelled to pen a follow-up in the form of Songs In The Key Of Yikes. Mac McCaughan, guitarist Jim Wilbur, and bassist Laura Ballance promoted their touring drummer, Laura King, to provide full-time recording duties, to rally around even tighter and resist against the bleakness through their music.
That paradox is very much the order of the record, that’s tracklisting reads like the inside pages of an outcast teenager. ‘Bruised Lung’, ‘Care Less’ and ‘Everybody Dies’ have you taking a sharp intake of breath at the thought of what enslaught may follow, but in reality, the composition sounds like the setlist of said teenage house party. A feeling that’s particularly prominent on the lead track, ‘Is It Making You Feel Something?’.
Ultimately there is a no thrills approach to the entire recording of this album that is surely charming on ‘Climb The Walls’ and ‘Cue’ which take time to follow tightly woven guitar lines and delicate vocal takes, while given way to the newly introduced King’s drum beats. Those two tracks in particular feel like garage rock in the purest, most charming essence.
Elsewhere on the album, the formula becomes somewhat tiresome. Of course, the raw aesthetic of unfiltered live instrumentation is a safe space for their lyrics of communal hope in the face of despair to exist, but it ultimately lacks nuance. “Everything is beautiful and everything just sucks” from ‘Everybody Dies’ is the sort of lyric you catch at a party in which they play and struggle to get on board with, no matter how bliss the ignorance of the night may be.
Despite the sea of self designed pastiche that occupies most of the album’s B-side, the record closes out nicely with ‘Some Green’. Some clever melody writing is bolstered by the acoustic guitar performance and the vocal performance feels slightly more multi-dimensional than it had elsewhere. Ultimately, had the idea of the record begun here, a gateway into variety may have presented itself to the band. Because in this crucial age of artistic resistance, a captivating nuance is required. Nostalgic rebellion simply won’t do.
Defining track – ‘Some Green’: In an album washed with downstroke guitars and overly anthemic chorus’, this feels like a welcome step change that feels more compositionally considered.
For fans of: The misguided idea of what 1990s house parties were like.
A concluding comment from the badly dressed bloke at the pub: “Why aren’t you dancing along, do you not like guitars or something?”
Release Date: August 22nd, 2025 | Producer: Paul Voran | Label: Merge Records
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