Pressing Concerns: Generifus, Cal Rifkin, Vulture Feather, The Stools

It’s time for Pressing Concerns, to be sure. Today’s post features new albums from Generifus, Vulture Feather, and The Stools, and a new EP from Cal Rifkin. If you missed Tuesday’s post, featuring PONY, Parister, Good Looking Son, and Kicking Bird, check that one out too.

If you’re looking for more new music, you can visit the site directory to see what else we’ve written about lately. If you’d like to support Rosy Overdrive, you can share this (or another) post, or donate here.

Generifus – Rearrangel

Release date: June 2^nd
Record label: Anything Bagel/Bud Tapes
Genre: Alt-country, folk rock
Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital
Pull Track: Rearrangel

Olympia, Washington folk rocker Spencer Sult has been making and putting out music as Generifus with various casts of musicians since the mid-2000s, frequently on his own label, Sultan Serves. Rearrangel is the first Generifus record in three years–something of a long gap for the fairly prolific Sult–and for this one, he’s receiving help in releasing it through a couple of Pacific Northwest stalwart labels in Anything Bagel (Vista House, Bluest) and Bud Tapes (Jack Habegger’s Celebrity Telethon, Jonny G and the Music Factory). On Rearrangel, Sult is joined by a wide range of local musicians, including producer Zach Burba of Dear Nora and singer-songwriter Lee Baggett. These ten songs are sharply penned folk-country tunes dressed up smartly but not distractingly by Sult’s collaborators, creating an immediately friendly album with plenty of depth as well.

The opening title track to Rearrangel is a welcoming party of a song–it’s a breezy, busy, but laid-back folk rock featuring some ace guitar contributions from Baggett. The record segues nicely into some more subtle, cosmic country moments from there with “Didn’t Even Look at the Mountain” and “Heat of the Night”, and the ballad of “Island from the Car” climbs atop the middle of the album confidently. In the second half of Rearrangel, Generifus offer up another acoustic-strummed cruiser in “Drive Away”, which turns the aching at its core into something nevertheless pleasant. “My Teacher” presents itself as barebones folk rock, allowing the titular question Sult asks to resonate. The opening title track’s triumphant sound is matched by the closing country rock of “Fearless Dealer”, another track that finds a well of inspiration in an unlikely place. Generifus believe that the titular dealer deserves to be played out with excited guitar solos and spirited rock and roll, and I can’t find myself disagreeing with how it sounds. (Bandcamp link)

Cal Rifkin – Better Luck Next Year

Release date: May 30^th
Record label: Really Rad
Genre: Power pop, pop punk, jangle pop
Formats: Cassette, digital
Pull Track: Down South

Cal Rifkin is a Washington, D.C. power pop trio who’ve been kicking around since 2018–this week’s Better Luck Next Year is their second EP, following a self-titled one in 2020 and a couple of singles. Two of their previously-released singles show up on their latest five-track record, which serves as an excellent introduction to the intriguing style of guitar pop that the group (guitarist/vocalist Erik Grimm, drummer Keith Butler Jr., and bassist Robin Rhodes) makes. Better Luck Next Year strikes a balance between the music–which cranks up the amps to evoke the fuzzier, louder end of the power pop spectrum–and Grimm’s vocals, which are gentle, melodic, and frequently harmonized, sitting on the “quietly pretty” end. I definitely hear some Teenage Fanclub here, but also the louder end of 2nd Grade, Supers -crush and -drag, and some Matthew Sweet.

Better Luck Next Year opens with “Down South”, their version of an unstoppable, massive jangly power pop anthem–Grimm can sing that chorus as understated as possible, but it’s still going to be a runaway train. Grimm declares “So just go on and break my heart in two / It’ll be the best thing you could do,” in the shimmering pop rock of “Break My Heart”–the whole thing’s a real Power Pop Moment. The wide-open spaces and power chords of “I Know I Can’t Stay” imagines a power pop version of modern heartland indie rock like Wild Pink, and the chugging title track offers up an interesting change of pace as well. The jangle pop “Skater Vidz” (as in “all I really wanna do is watch them with you”) closes the EP on a note of subtlety, humanity, and ace songwriting. (Bandcamp link)

Vulture Feather – Liminal Fields

Release date: June 2^nd
Record label: Felte
Genre: Post-punk, art rock
Formats: Vinyl, digital
Pull Track: Bell of Renewal

Wilderness were a Baltimore-based 2000s indie rock band who put out three albums on Jagjaguwar, recorded with Beauty Pill’s Chad Clark, and toured with Dan Friel’s pre-Upper Wilds band, Parts & Labor. All of that would suggest a band I would enjoy, but I never checked them out, and they seemed to disappear at the end of that decade. Fifteen years after their last album, however, half of Wilderness (guitarist Colin McCann and bassist Brian Gossman) have reemerged in the tiny northern California town of Hayfork, and along with drummer Eric Fiscus, have a new trio called Vulture Feather. From the bit of Wilderness I’ve now listened to, it sounds like McCann and Gossman have picked up where their last band left off, making a slow, deliberate, Lungfish-esque version of guitar-heavy post-punk.

While Liminal Fields, the debut Vulture Feather album, contains a bit of that 2000s indie rock bombast that aughts post-punkers like Wolf Parade practiced, the continued popularity of this kind of music into the 2010s and 2020s ensures that the band don’t sound dated–if anything, the zeitgeist has caught up to them. The primary difference is Vulture Feather’s lack of interest in speed or aggression–these songs move along at their own pace, feeling unhitched from any sense of time. The album is 38 minutes long, but you could’ve told me it was significantly shorter or longer and I’d probably have believed you. The rhythm section lumbers, McCann’s guitar chimes and drones, and his vocals sound focused but emotive, gamely supplying these eight songs with the final ingredient in turning a lot of them into unlikely anthems. (Bandcamp link)

The Stools – R U Saved?

Release date: June 2^nd
Record label: Feel It
Genre: Garage punk, hardcore punk, blues punk
Formats: Vinyl, digital
Pull Track: Stare Scared

The Stools heard that you liked Detroit garage punk, and now they’re banging at your front door. Indeed, the press for R U Saved?, their debut album after a few EPs and singles, mentions a lot of Those names– MC5, Stooges, Gories (with whom The Stools are touring with later in the year)–but really, all you need to know about this music is that it’s loud, dirty, ripping garage punk. Okay, okay, one other Detroit band is worth mentioning here: Negative Approach. The Stools of R U Saved? (guitarist/vocalist Will Lorenz, bassist/vocalist Krystian Quint, drummer Charles Stahl) balance themselves between the version of punk rock that’s just mussed up rock-and-roll and the aggression of hardcore, and it’s a captivating place for them to be.

R U Saved? opens with the blues-y punk sprint of “Stare Scared”, and then The Stools follow it with a couple of songs that show off their fuzzy, frantic, hardcore side.  The title track is a stomp, based around a massive riff and some chanted vocals that skulk around it, and the three-minute “Conner & Hell” takes the record into the direction of Cramps-esque strut-punk. “Into the Street” is a fun and incredibly cool-sounding tune that kicks off the second half of the album, letting you all know R U Saved? isn’t going to slow down any time soon. Highlights keep coming–the vintage punk rock of “Rum Runner”, the all-out “Bad Eye Bob”, and the cranked-up closing track “Tunnels” all stick out to me at this time. I’d open that door if I were you. (Bandcamp link)

Also notable:

• Califone – Villagers
• Ryan Wong – The New Country Sounds of Ryan Wong
• Bully – Lucky for You
• Laura Wolf – Shelf Life
• The Hannah Barberas – Fantastic Tales of the Sea
• Lila Tristam – Home EP
• The Ballet – Daddy Issues
• Strapping Fieldhands – Lyve: In Concrete
• Miss España – Niebla Mental
• Shrinkwrap Killers – Feed the Clones Pt. 1
• Lysol – Down the Street EP
• Wine Pride – Wine Pride
• RIGHTING – The Difference in Greys
• Water Damage – Two Songs
• Wolf Eyes – Dreams in Splattered Lines
• Shirley Collins – Archangel Hill
• Twin Princess – Blood Moon
• Spoils System – Smoke Signals
• Kevin Morby – More Photographs (A Continuum)
• Spirit Award – The Fear
• Divine Sweater – Down Deep (A Nautical Apocalypse)
• The Split Bell Chime – The Split Bell Chime EP
• Electric Chair – Beat Session Vol 11
• Daniel Blumberg – GUT
• Miya Folick – Roach