In writing about Bueno's Illuminate Your Room the other day, I mentioned that -- to me -- it gave off a very New York vibe. I could say the same thing, but only more so, about the latest album from Parquet Courts, Human Performance.
On this, their third official LP, the New York four-piece channel a set of influences into a sound and aesthetic that can't be called anything but punk. You can try to lump Parquet Courts in with indie rock or straight-ahead rock and roll, but there is an underlying sense of politics and social criticism that bubbles up through the unconventional song structures.
Opener "Dust" can be taken literally. It's impossible to avoid the smog and pollution of the city. But I feel like the dust, which "sneaks in ignored," can also signify the way the city changes a person from the inside. "I Was Just Here" gets at that jarring feeling of not being able to keep up with the changes happening around you -- from relationships to the city itself. One of my favorite images on the record comes on "Captive of the Sun." The narrator sings about the sounds of the city from his self-imposed imprisonment in his apartment: "It's a drive-by lullaby that couldn't get worse, a melody abandoned in the key of New York."
There's really too much here to cover in a capsule review -- the lack of authenticity in human interaction in an age of social media, an attempt to come to grips with the violence we see every day, dissolving relationships, feeling like an outsider or a social misfit. Suffice it to say that Human Performance takes on all of these issues in ways that we don't hear every day from guitar-based punk or rock music. Parquet Courts have created a distinct voice; and -- this sounds so corny to say -- they're an important band, especially in 2016.
Human Performance is out now on Rough Trade. Parquet Courts play Asbury Park's Wonder Bar TOMORROW, December 9th. Tickets are still available for that one. Try not to miss it.
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