The Can’t Tells are Blaze McKenzie, Michael DiSanto and Jonathan Smith, a Brooklyn three-piece who ply their trade at the intersection between power-pop and punk. Following up previous release No Television, the band are set to put out a new EP this coming January. Titled simply EP, the release consists of four ‘parts’ rather than songs, intended to be played as a continuous piece.
First single (or Pt. 1), ‘Faulting’ is a song of modern dissatisfaction and anxiety that tries to pin down the nebulous concept of identity and individuality in a world where everything seems to be atomised and complicated. Here the narrator exists in a dichotomous (or perhaps multichotomous) state, spread thin across various opinions and emotions. To highlight this the main vocals are underpinned by half-audible spoken word segments reminiscent of R.E.M.’s ‘Orange Crush’, often undermining the other vocals and thus heightening the fractured sense of confusion and doubt.
“It’s clear you’re attempting to erase
things you didn’t mean to say
A fear of truth is going to make a liar out of you.”
The song comes complete with an Adam Curtis-esque video of public domain footage which explores the “ghostly middle ground between reality and fiction” and exudes a strange, unclear sense of importance, the disparate images demanding to be processed and reassembled into some cohesive narrative or meaning.
The EP is out on on the 20th January and you can pre-order it now from The Can’t Tells Bandcamp page.