You probably know by now that we consider LA-based band Young Jesus to be one of the most interesting and important bands plying their trade right now. The writing prowess of lead John Rossiter was clear from their full-length debut Home, and really came to the fore on last year’s Grow / Decompose (an album we described as “both pessimistic and hopeful, a statement that we seem unable to change for the better and a reminder that we are united by this monumental whammy”). Not content, they recently put out Void as Lob, a two-song EP/double single via Funeral Sounds, a release which strikes right at what it means to be alive and human in the 21st century. As we put it in our review:
“Young Jesus tell of a world where the capital-G God has been removed yet atheism remains a flimsy myth, its inhabitants left locked in a desperate search for something to believe in”
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Due to a copious amount of writing and recording, Rossiter recently decided to put out a new single every week for the rest of the summer (and beyond), cutting the waiting time needed for an official release in the hope that the new material would give us a more immediate view into his current creative head space. The first song, aptly titled ‘1’, further develops the now signature balance of sadness and hope that constitutes Young Jesus’ sound, though occupies a far mellower space, switching out the sometimes frenzied delivery of Grow / Decompose in favour of gentle vocals and acoustic guitar.
“When I held you dear to me,
I clutched you linked a feather
in the wind you drift away
try and send another letter”
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Next came ‘2’, a track which toes the line between garage rock and drone with its distorted guitar and Rossiter’s dreamy vocals which put the stream into stream of consciousness, tumbling forth with a constant rhythm which almost becomes a logic unto itself. “I wanna wake up to some rain at least some dew,” he sings to begin the one long sentence, “I wanna lick the grass and taste the desert turn into a prairie where the prairie dogs are hanging out with normal dogs.” By the time the instrumentation swells again at the track’s finale, you get the sense the noise is out-competing the words rather than concluding them, the sentence rattling on indefinitely.
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After two weeks of the aforementioned song-a-week plan, Rossiter gave in to immediacy even further and bundled the next four songs into an EP. Neverending Catalogue of Total Garbage picks up where ‘1’ left off, love songs for a strange love, one of superstition and warning, where even the simplest action or imagery carries some metaphorical weight. “Sorting through all the small scraps of paper in my pockets,” Rossiter sings on opener ‘3’. “I see your name repeated often”.
‘4’ sees the guitar work become more intricate, the lyrics still peculiar but somehow more free, while ‘5’ sees things slow to a half-paced strum before opening into a warm second section that utilises repetitive rhythm and field recordings to channel The Microphones at their best. From this emerges closer ‘6’, an instrumental track of wordless vocals and improvised percussion and a dense background drone which presses inwards, constantly, quietly and ever so slowly.
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You can grab all of the new music from the Young Jesus Bandcamp page on a pay-what-you-can basis. If you’re interested, we spoke with John Rossiter about his work last year, and his recent chat with Sinker Cypress Press if also worth a read.
Artwork by Elizabeth Rossiter