Brooklyn’s Radical Dads are about to release Universal Coolers, their third album and the follow up to last year’s Cassette Brain EP. The band, comprised of ex-Clap Your Hands Say Yeah drummer Robbie Guertin, Chris Diken and guitarist/vocalist Lindsay Baker, draw inspiration from the guitar rock of heavyweights such as Pavement and Yo La Tengo, creating a hook-laden, melodic brand of twin guitar (zero bass) indie rock.

Opener ‘Absurd Tests’ sets the tone, a sub-two minute shot in the arm of carefree and ramshackle DIY rock. ‘Tomorrow’s Trash’ is all squealing guitars and Baker’s volatile delivery, while ‘Slammer’ is a blend of spiky rock and romantic dream pop, with some pretty odd (but funny) lyrics. “Snakes on the sidewalk / all over my block / I won’t go outside any more/ Good lord, they’re up to my front door”.

‘In the Water is a song about the repression of the masses, “And the negative creeps keep coming around / piling up as we’re shutting down / you can’t see it from the surface you can’t identify its purpose / its in the water”, but my current favourite track is ‘Don’t Go’, which has a really great, catchy chorus of, “Prepared pianos in our room / the kids come up to dance in the doom / new signs will soon appear in space / don’t worry dear, don’t go away”.

The title track features a simple shout-along chorus of “Universal Coolers!”, with ‘verses’ comprised of lots of squally noise and mumbled vocals. The yelled chorus trend continues on ‘Desperado Dude Lens’ (“Your name on a plaque at the world’s end / white hairs flying back in the wind / he’s going up the trail / he’s got that ex-explorer desperado dude lens”), before ‘Flight To NZ’ shakes things up with an almost spoken word account of the titular flight to New Zealand (“hey we were going away / headed for a new place / sitting on the tarmac / a couple, a couple of former sad sacks”), complete with roaring guitars and slamming drums.

The final two tracks are DJ Pancake, with its time-bomb percussion, and Cassette Brain (which you may recognise from the aforementioned EP), which is all low rumbling guitars and a pounding drum beat, and, at its core a love song. “We won’t get swept away / you will clear the toxic sludge from my head / we’ll go to the library and hammer away each day we’re not dead”. Basically, Universal Coolers is a really great indie rock record and if you find you can’t enjoy it then perhaps there is something wrong with you. I firmly believe that the “virtues” of innovation and trendsetting are majorly over-rated. If every band poured as much love, care and carefree energy into their records then the world would be a better place, both musically and otherwise.

You can order Universal Coolers now via Old Flame Records (who have also released albums by Shark?, Swimming and You Won’t), on either CD or limited edition blue or black vinyl.

P.S. Here’s a fun fact for you – The artwork was produced by Steve Keene, the prolific Greenpoint artist who designed some pretty famous album covers such as Pavement’s Wowee Zowee.

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“Most of the songs have something to do with the fear of being trapped in a feeble body, dreams of a muscular form and the relationship between one’s environment, one’s body and one’s being an idiot. I don’t work out a lot, but I think about it often.”

If that sounds weird or in any way preachy, rest assured Working Out is only one of those things. The first single sees a nice dose of humour to back things up. “I think it sounds like a little dog or other animal trying to express malfunctions.” Levy told me in an email. “It also kinda sounds a little bit like scout niblett and saetia, but not really.” 

The first single ‘Dead Lamb’ is available now and seems to be pretty close to the comparisons above. Although, rather than a small dog, I’d compare his vocals to halfway between Daniel Johston and Alec Ounsworth of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!

Levy did send me some tour dates with Playlounge which I fully intended to share with you. Unfortunately, due to us being horrible, inefficient people, the tour ended earlier this week.

Working Out will be released on Art is Hard and Reeks of Effort on the 17th November. You can pre-order it here.

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