SPIRAL HEADS
The more we experience in life, the more the idea of passing time starts to feel more abstract and hard to pinpoint. We’re reminded that it is a man-made concept, a means to construct reality, label events neatly, and make sense of it all. But Brooklyn/Boston-based Spiral Heads’ music effuses punk in a way that seems to exist simultaneously in different cultural moments. The band effortlessly spans decades at once: the soft and honest subject matter of ‘60s Kinks and Pretty Things, the swagger and angular speed of late ‘70s Buzzcocks and Wire, the raw energy of early ‘80s Blitz and The Adolescents, the icey darkness of The Chameleons and Echo and the Bunnymen, and the anthemic pop sensibility of early ‘90s Teenage Fanclub and Ride. The result is a sound that transcends tidy categorization.
Featuring Simon Doom (Modest Mouse, MGMT), Jim Carroll (American Nightmare), and Q (Doomriders), the three-piece formed after many years of knowing one another to pay homage to their collective musical roots. In October 2019, the band released their first self-titled EP (Spiral Heads) through Quiet Panic/Bridge 9. In early March (2020), Spiral Heads decided to set up a couple of mics in their Brooklyn rehearsal space and record some new songs they had been working on. One such result was “Nothing New”, a song about bringing learned behavior from past relationships into current ones. If they had waited only a couple more days, the COVID-19 quarantine would have prevented this burst of creation from coming to fruition, reminding us that though time is a construct, timing is important. “Nothing New b/w What's Going on in Your Head” was released as a digital single in August of the same year.
Unable to get together in person, the 3 band members would spend the remainder of the lockdown sending each other unfinished demos and song ideas for feedback. These new songs evolved in sound as well, many of them featuring Jim and Simon sharing the role of lead singer. The solitude and heaviness of the years past informed a more laid-back and somber approach to songwriting, with lyrics focused on loneliness, death, and self-awareness. What came out of this was reminiscent of late ‘70s power pop through an ‘80s Hardcore lens: think Flamin’ Groovies featuring members of Gray Matter and the Sound.
As the world slowly began to open up, the band was still not without barriers, not all of which were negative. For example, Simon had the opportunity to join Modest Mouse in 2021, leading to consistent time on the road and making recording/getting together as a band even more challenging. Still, Spiral Heads remained committed to being a band and were finally able to physically regroup. In the winter of 2022, they took their birth of new material to Academy Fight Songs (Red Hook, Brooklyn). Under the guidance of producer Walter Schreifels (Quicksand, Rival Schools, Gorilla Biscuits), the band knocked out 13 moody and simultaneously energetic bangers in a little more than a week. The rough tracks were then forwarded to Noel Heroux (Hooray For Earth, Mass Gothic) to be mixed. Thus, Spiral Heads' debut LP, initially formed while fully immersed in quarantine madness, became an actuality close to four years (seemingly a lifetime) later.
The album begins with the Flying Nun-inspired distorted pop jangle, “One of My Dreams,” and ends with the somber tribute to late-’80s Damned, “World Without Pain.” Throughout the record, the listener is exposed to the wallowing loneliness of Jim's “Just So Down” and “Don't Wanna See You Around,” Simon's tongue-in-cheek nihilism on “NY Sorrow” and “The Roomba,” and the unnerving confessional intimacy of the Colin Newman-esque, “Seizure in Paris,” “One Before the One,” and “The Day My Baby Stopped Breathing.” Though the material was primarily conceived in isolation, the album as a whole purveys a sense of musical cohesion, as if the band didn't compose a note outside the company of one another. The result is the rabble-rousing, boot-stomping, 13-track sing-along that is Spiral Heads... ‘Til I'm Dead.