Preoccupations
New Material

THE REVIEW

From various sources, I've been advised to keep an eye on this album as one of the most interesting releases of the upcoming period. Frankly, before getting my hands on it, I didn't even know that the Preoccupations were practically the same indie rock band from Calgary, Alberta (the one from Risk) formerly known as Viet Cong. After all, the quartet changed their name in the aftermath of the release of their second LP in 2016 (which is indeed titled "Preoccupations") and with this new "moniker" they challenge the music world and listeners with a new release on Jagjaguwar titled "New Material," preceded by the release of the single "Espionage."

The group worked on the album in complete solitude and almost in a state of isolation with the goal of producing songs with a decidedly more powerful and marked tone compared to the past and at the same time darker, marked by a dark vein that, according to frontman Matt Flegel, is a true "ode to depression and self-sabotage." Songs practically built by looking within oneself with what can be called "true hatred." Hence the title of the single "Espionage"—as if to define this process of inner exploration, let's say, indiscreetly—and "New Material" for the concrete results obtained at the end of this speculative process and which was indeed a collective effort.

With the refinement work of producer Justin Meldal-Johnson, "New Material" is clearly an album inspired by a certain dark aesthetic and subculture typically of the eighties and with clearly destructive and nihilistic content. The structure of the tracks is mostly identical from track to track, and all the songs are quite similar to each other due to the lack of variety in sounds, which includes all that usual range of imitations of David Bowie, abuse of synthesizers, evanescent guitars, riffs as sharp as blades, linear yet very pronounced bass lines, and pre-recorded or almost drum sounds. All, moreover, past their due time. And yet, evidently, we haven't had enough, considering the—relative—attention dedicated to such proposals that take up a typical claustrophobia and theatricality, and the same aesthetics as their label mates Unknown Mortal Orchestra as well as Foxygen, with Matt Flegel and company being considered as the yin and the Westlake Village duo being the yang.