Slow Pulp - Yard (2023) Hi Res

here is an attractive Midwestern solidity to Slow Pulp like Wolf Alice with softer, blurry edges or Wednesday without the Southern-fried crust. The Chicago-via-Madison quartet's debut album, 2020's Moveys, tracked tragedies around singer Emily Massey like a scoreboard: the back injury that ended her dream of being a professional ballerina, the double-whammy diagnosis of Lyme disease and chronic mono, the after-effects of a scary car accident involving her parents and the resulting move home to care for them that ended up isolating her during pandemic lockdowns. Follow-up Yard is the story of Massey's perseverance and the coping mechanism of living in her head; everything the shoegaze, the slacker rock, the moodiness is turned up this time, like she's determined to make up for any lost opportunities. Excellent "Cramps" is heavy but bouncy classic '90s indie melodicism and zippy drums (courtesy of Teddy Mathews) with Massey's wail buried in a cocoon-like effect that it sounds like she's trying to escape: "She seems so ambitious/ Talking and she's spitting/ And I think I know what I'm missing/ There's nothing better/ Watch out for Heather." Turns out, she's conjuring up the superpower of a tough outer shell. "It is about searching for things you wish you had in other people and creating this character in your head that has all the physical and emotional attributes you feel that you are lacking," Massey has said. (The title? "My period cramps were particularly bad that day.") "Yard" finds her singing over a sturdy piano riff in a way that recalls the early-days melancholy of another Midwestern queen, Liz Phair, as Massey chides herself with hindsight: "I didn't get much sleep cause I twitch ... I'm a bitch, I've been a bitch/ … I've been selfish/ I'm sorry I wasn't there enough/ It's on meeeeeeeeeeeee." "Slugs" exudes a tender center that's in no way twee or wimpy, projecting on a future breakup even at the peak of new-love bliss: "Oh, when it, it all ends again/ What if I tell you that/ You'll be playing in my head/ 'Cause you're a summer hit." Acoustic "Carina Phone 1000" is dreamy, while "Worm," with its lackadaisical slacker guitars, sounds recorded on a far, faraway landline. "Broadview" surprises by kicking back with slow roll, Neil Young style. And "Doubt" is casually masterful (evoking Phoebe Bridgers with a harder-rocking band), even if Massey isn't sure of herself: "Am I not enough or too much/ Can you fix this?/ I think I'm ready to commit/ Come watch me swing it and miss it."