PREMIERE // The Lopez – Hobby Lobby

Post by Misha

It’s really something when a band makes a pair of headphones into a grimy basement show.

House lights blast through peeling layers of scuzz and illuminate the teeming mass below. The teeming mess. Hey, that’d be a good band name. Anyway illuminates a messy teeming mass for just a moment, then it is dark again until the next strobe passes through us like a lightning bolt, like touching the electric fence, like the first breath after sitting at the bottom of the swimming pool for too long, eyes stinging and blurry around the edges.

There is a shout from across the room, or under the room, or from over the PA system in the sky. It is this song, barely audible over everything else. It’s hard to make out, but it sounds important, or irreverent, or both. It is full of laughter and trouble and the promise of an inside joke.

You know, sometimes I think that nothing will ever be as pure as the music that is happening right now. I know that realistically that can’t really be true – the music will continue to be what and how we need it to be, but still. I do think we’re living through something rather special. This music is just so willing to be what it is without straining itself through the filters of genre, or permission, or description. ‘Hobby Lobby’ is a little punk and a little pop, of course. A little fierce, a little funny. But mostly, the whole feeling of going to the show. Dancing. Telling jokes. The sweat in your hair. Being part of something, somewhere, for a while. The messiness of that.

And the far-away-ness, too. Or the being close but not close enough-ness. Struggling to be heard in a noisy room.

Pittsburgh rockers The Lopez are releasing their album Heart Punch on May 11th, the band’s first release since the tragic passing of one of their members, Jesse Flati. For those in the Pittsburgh area there will be a release party on May 11th – more information on the event here. The release represents a celebration of Jesse’s life and the Pittsburgh DIY community, who worked together to make sure the album got released physically, with a fully independent vinyl release and a run of tapes on Crafted Sounds. We’re honored to premiere the first single today.