Brooklyn-based punk trio Thick have released a new song ‘Mansplain’, which features on the band’s debut album, 5 Years Behind, out next week on Epitaph. The track is a blistering, brilliantly sarcastic takedown, bookended by a sound collage of massively infuriating comments from men (e.g., “Girl bands are really in right now,” “Here, let me help you carry your amp,” “Are those your boyfriend’s drums?”). “Those are all things that men have actually said to us or our friends at shows,” drummer and vocalist Shari Page points out.

Even in their most exasperated moments, Thick sustain a ferocious energy and untamed joy, ultimately turning every song into a wildly cathartic anthem. “A lot of these songs came from feeling stifled in silence, but then the song itself is an answer to that,” says Kate Black (vocals, bass, guitar). “It’s us saying, ‘I have my opinion, and I’m going to share it no matter what.’ Instead of keeping things all bottled up, it feels so much better to face everything head on, and just be really loud about it with your two best friends.”   

5 Years Behind came to life at Studio G Brooklyn with producer/engineer Joel Hamilton (Iggy Pop, Jolie Holland). In a departure from their previous work, the band took a more spontaneous approach to the album-making process, sometimes completely reworking songs at the eleventh hour in order to channel the most immediate emotion into each track. “It was really important to us that the songs feel emotionally connected to our reality, so that it feels as natural as possible to play them,” notes Black.

On May 15 Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas) will release his fifth studio album, Set My Heart On Fire Immediately, via Matador Records. The first single, ‘Describe’, is a track that captures a sense living in the moment through a heavy fog of grisly distortion and tumbling slide guitars. Hadreas notes, “it started as a really sombre ballad. It was very minimal and very slow. And then it turned into this beast of a song. I started writing about when you are in such a dark place that you don't even remember what goodness is or what anything feels like. And so, the idea was having someone describe that to you, because you forgot or can’t get to it.” Its accompanying video, self-directed by Hadreas, envisions “an end of the world where there are no boundaries, there are no edges, no rules, or the rules are completely new with how you interact with each other and the space around you."

The music video for ‘Describe’ was directed by Hadreas and features Seattle-based choreographer Kate Wallich’s dance company The YC. Wallich and Hadreas worked together on 2019’s The Sun Still Burns Here, a collaborative dance performance in which Hadreas wrote the music and performed.

Set My Heart On Fire Immediately sees Hadreas re-teaming with Grammy-nominated producer Blake Mills and features contributions from musicians Jim Keltner, Pino Palladino, Matt Chamberlin and Rob Moose. It was recorded in Los Angeles, where Perfume Genius settled in 2017 with longtime partner and musical collaborator Alan Wyffels.