Enjoy and Puzzle embarked on a co-headlining tour this spring and made a stop at Columbus’s own Newport Music Hall. The tour follows the release of their newest albums—”The Sound of Deceit” by Enjoy and “Damage Collection!” by Puzzle.
Puzzle
Puzzle performed first, accompanied on stage by a bassist and drummer. Fletcher Shears’ music has become intertwined with industrial drum and bass over the past five years, which brought a palpable energy from both the crowd and the speakers. Fletcher entertained the audience by jumping around haphazardly and eventually laying flat on the floor like a dead man. Despite the heavy, high-energy backing of these tracks, they’re often paired with piano or synth melodies that offer a calming counterbalance—exemplified in songs like “Bankrupt (i hear it makes you smile).”
Another signature element of Fletcher’s work is his use of samples. One of the side projects within their Vada Vada collective is Turkey, composed of William Sipos and Fletcher Shears. It’s genuinely hard to say whether the drums were electronically produced or performed live by Fletcher. This fusion of electronic instrumentation is a delight, especially when you catch a sample from a favorite video game. “The Bouncer” includes audio from an early cutscene in “Metal Gear Solid” (1998, PlayStation), and the title is pulled from “The Bouncer,” a 2000 beat ’em up game for the PS2. (Check out the trailer featuring the sample: The Bouncer Opening (PS2) (HD Quality)
Enjoy
Enjoy’s performance featured a full band, with two guitarists and a drummer, while the man himself, Wyatt Shears, took up the bass. His latest album includes a track featuring the lead vocalist of glam metal band L.A. Guns, who got their start in 1983. Continuing the theme of blending old and new, Enjoy’s set included “I’m Content” (2012) and “Drink Myself to Sleep” (2025). The latter is my personal favorite from The Sound of Deceit—its layered guitars have a crunch that pulls you in and strings you out. If you listen to any track off the new album, let it be this one.
Alabama Shakes reunited in December 2024 for a surprise performance for the first time since the announcement of their hiatus in 2018. As the group prepares to release new music and embark on their first tour in nearly a decade, we have decided to revisit the group’s sophomore album, “Sound and Color,” released ten years ago to critical acclaim.
Truly, it’s hard to believe it’s been this long since this record came out. I remember the day it came out, seeing it plastered on the front of the iTunes store. Now, after several years of lead vocalist, Brittany Howard, pursuing a solo career, Alabama Shakes have chosen to return to the scene, and we could not be any more thrilled.
Title track, “Sound and Color,” opens with this hypnotic vibraphone introduction, slowly painting the foundation of the record, adding in shuffled drums and keys. “Sound and Color” repeats through the outro, with Howard’s impeccable harmonies synergizing with emotive expression, “I want to touch a human being…ain’t life just awful strange?” It has been previously said that the track is about an astronaut that has been frozen in time, coming back to life and seeing how much things have changed. I think this can be applied as a metaphor for experiencing loneliness and isolation, which Howard is all-too-familiar with through her experiences as a black, queer woman growing up in the South, and as someone who has experienced significant loss from a young age. The track lays the groundwork for the rest of the album, with sound painting brushstrokes of deep, velvety mauves through spinning sound. Maybe it’s just the power of suggestion through the album title, but it’s hard to refrain from associating color with the various tracks on the record.
“Don’t Wanna Fight,” opens with a twangy, syncopated guitar duet that brings out this light green hue from the background, reworking the feel from the first track. It’s effervescent and refreshing, contrasting with the lyrical content depicting a relationship marred by incompatibility. It’s easy to understand why this was chosen as the lead single ahead of the full album release. Howard’s jagged “ooh” heading into the first verse is sharp as a razor, cutting through the music and putting her presence at center stage.
“Dunes” occupies a space somewhere at the crossroad of Led Zeppelin and MC5 with a dash of Aretha Franklin. Initially, the production leaves me feeling like I have water in my ears from the equalization of Howard’s vocals. I can look past this for the artistic effect it adds, especially in stereo, and I think this is an underrated song from the Shakes’ discography. It’s pure 70s in its sound; the dry, muffled drums and dirty fuzz complement Howard’s magnificently-blended harmonies.
“Future People” proves to me that Alabama Shakes songs hit their stride after their intro. The jagged bass, synth, or whatever it may be, adds such a garage lo-fi component that makes it feel like I could be listening to a record I found in a long-forgotten bin at a record shop just waiting for someone to give it the time of day.
“Gimme All Your Love” plays with dynamics in a manner that really showcases the band’s musical abilities. The opening guitar and snare hits will jolt anyone unfamiliar with the track. This grandiose entrance oscillates between punchy guitar and clean, sizzly ride pings. This song is gentle, soulful, and romantic, but comes in blazing with the chorus. In my opinion, as unpopular as this may be, the bridge is the best part. The walking, booming, muted bass line coupled with syncopated keys and sloshy open-hat drums leading into a pre chorus call-and-response of the guitar between right and left channels is impeccable. “Gimme All Your Love” is undoubtedly the highlight of the album, and in an album full of incredible musicianship, this says a lot.
“This Feeling” completely changes the vibe, embracing minimalism and stripping down all of the fanfare and fuzz, while still making it clear who is behind this song. The nylon string guitar, upright bass, and hand drum keep things moving along, no big muff necessary. “Guess Who” keeps things chill, embracing the lo-fi, homemade aesthetic that takes over the middle of this record.
“Gemini” is the longest track on the record, clocking in at 6:35. This is a song that warrants a few listens. I find myself oscillating attention from the phasing keys dancing between my right and left ear, and Howard’s hypnotic, echoing vocals. The drums feel like they’re on the back end of the beat, which builds that tension in the song; the drums take the backseat here, but their presence is not lost on me. I love the way the album plays with stereo sound, it feels like the song is flossing my brain. The incorporation of auxiliary percussion contrasts the crying bit-crushed guitar.
“Gemini” is the longest track on the record, clocking in at 6:35. This is a song that warrants a few listens. I find myself oscillating attention from the phasing keys dancing between my right and left ear, and Howard’s hypnotic, echoing vocals. The drums feel like they’re on the back end of the beat, which builds that tension in the song; the drums take the backseat here, but their presence is not lost on me. I love the way the album plays with stereo sound, it feels like the song is flossing my brain. Additionally, the incorporation of auxiliary percussion contrasts the crying bit-crushed guitar tone with incredible complementation.
“Over My Head” closes out the album, it feels almost like a requiem for “Sound and Color,” Howard proclaims “loving so deeply, I’m in over my head” over and over again, contrasting the feelings of loneliness in the beginning of the album. Love and relationships can be complicated; human interaction is often a strange push-pull relationship beyond what we will ever be able to understand.
Brittany Howard may have ended Alabama Shakes’ last album with emotions over her head, but her time as a solo artist has allowed her to grow significantly as an artist. The group has announced their return with the pending release of their first record in a decade, and I cannot wait to see what the future holds for this incredible group of artists, including catching them on tour this summer.
This is a column on Polyvox mag dot com. The column is called Makeout Music, which is indicative of the contents. My name is Jenny Hanover. I’m usually a poet from Pittsburgh, PA. However, I double as a former college music director and kissing connoisseur, so I’m going to be breaking down some of the best albums to kiss to of all time.
This time around, I’m going to be reviewing my first READER SUBMITTED ALBUM! (This is the part where you all cheer). One of my thousands of dedicated readers submitted one of their favorite albums for making out, You Win Again by Spivak. I’ve heard bits and pieces of this record, but I’m listening to it in full with dark intentions for the first time now with the rest of you.
Spivak hails from Nicosia, Cyprus, which means this column has now taken us to three distinctly different places. However, this record lacks a feeling of genuine space or time. A record like this that brings the listener outside of the spatial and temporal boundaries they are used to is perfect for kissing, because an ideal makeout loses track of everything but the act itself. Bodies become one another, the electronic hums of this album melt it all down into one thing.
Sonically, this thing has everything it needs to get the juices flowing. I’ve never made out to this record, but one of our cherished readers has (perhaps it was you!), and I’ve decided to second their take on it. At times I do feel like it drags on, not in terms of song length but in ambient noise repetition. And if that’s your bag, then this is the one for you. This record is a strong three out of five, and maybe kissing to it will improve my take. So, if anyone wants to give it a go, let me know. Kidding. Unless…
Best tracks: My Loneliness Is Healing Me, Risk & Chill, Golden Boy
Polyvox reader, do you have a great album to kiss to? Email me an album at minajbeach@gmail.com, and I’ll be the judge of that, thanks. Don’t worry- I’ll keep you anonymous.
Black Country, New Road has been through a lot together as a group. Lead guitarist and vocalist, Isaac Wood, left the group in 2022 at the advent of their sophomore album release, “Ants From Up There,” making much of their catalogue unperformable live. BC,NR have adapted to their new lineup, and released their first record since Isaac left the band. In celebration of new beginnings, I want to revisit their first LP, “For The First Time.” Released in 2021, For The First Time is raw and experimental, but refined compared to their early single releases of some of the same tracks. This is an incredibly underrated album, I believe this record is somewhere near the pinnacle of experimental post-punk coming out of the UK. It has everything–synths, saxophones, jazz influences, tongue-in-cheek references to niche content, and men who look like they would sell Jean-Michel Basquiat clones on the TikTok Shop.
Track 1, “Instrumental,” is just as it sounds. The track is likely one of the last things you would expect to hear coming from a post-punk record, yet, somehow it fits well. The track is tense, grandiose, and jazzy with its swung-time feel. This is a statement to set the scene for the remainder of the album. The uneasiness and tension built by this track flows perfectly into the next track, “Athens, France.”
“Athens, France” draws back the heat, but maintains a flickering flame of tension. The song opens with this guitar, drum, bass, minor key syncopated feel with a slower tempo. The mix is tight, and Isaac’s almost frantic vocals tie the atmosphere together. Just as you think the song is about to explode, the buildup of swirling saxophones and chaos cuts, resting on a single F chord. A light ostinato on drums, barely audible, joins, synth droning. A sense of clarity comes out of this, a stoic saxophone accompaniment. The song is reflective, pensive, and introspective. “It’s a one-size-fits-all hardcore cyberfetish, early noughties zine, she sells matcha shots to pay for printing costs and a PR team. She’s recently enlightened, somehow that fazes me…” depicts a critique of upper-class, posh characters who fantasize about being working class, so much so they would rather LARP than be admit their rent is financed by their trust fund. Isaac’s lyrics are incredibly clever, and his lyrical prowess facilitates a world that is easy to step into.
“Science Fair” has grown on me. Admittedly, this track was a skip for me for quite some time. The lyrics of this track paint a picture of someone who is the embodiment of the following tweet:
Anyways, despite the personal nature of the track, laden with references I likely will never understand, it managed to make me chuckle in all of the chaos of the music. “Just to think I could have left the fair with my dignity intact, and fled the stage with the world’s second-best Slint tribute act” is comically self-aware; one of the first things I ever thought of when listening to BC,NR, much like many others, was the stark similarity to the now defunct group Slint. Science fair continues, “still living with my mother, while I move from one microinfluencer to another.” I never thought I would ever hear the word “microinfluencer” in a song, to be honest. This line elicited a half-smile upon first listen; it’s a blunt, yet thoughtfully-placed nod to the experience of living in a digital era where social media allows anyone and everyone to be a “celebrity” in some way. Isaac Wood is a mastermind of capturing the aura of social anxiety and depersonalization–the science fair, the embarrassment, burning cheeks. All of this with a voice that sounds calm, yet markedly frantic and terrified at once.
Sunglasses is my favorite song off of this album. The song starts with this fuzzy guitar, and synth feeding back into itself. Something about the dissonance and ending on this huge open-D chord and going directly into a clean guitar riff just scratches this itch in my brain. The signature guitar riff comes in over the droning synths as the drums kick in, and the verse begins. Again, themes of class are rampant. “…She steams herself in marble rooms, courtesy of pigs” is rather upfront. Note, the lyric was originally “courtesy of big pharma” in the single version. Isaac gazes into the TV that only his girlfriend’s father could afford, while she spends money in excess.
The girlfriend’s mother is frail and weak, yet forced to appease her husband as she relies on his money. In this moment, Isaac knows that he, himself, is detached from this lifestyle of luxury, “and with frail hands she grips the NutriBullet, and the bite of its blades reminds me of a future that I am in no way part of,“ drives the point that as someone who is not upper class, he cannot relate to their anguish when there is such an excess of “things,” like the items that glow gold, the second living room etc. “In a wall of photographs in the downstairs second living room’s TV area, I become her father, and complain of mediocre theatre in the daytime, and ice in single-malt whiskey at night, rising skirt hems, lowering IQs and ‘things just aren’t built like they used to be,’ the absolute pinnacle of British engineering” pokes at the incessant need for the “old money” class to complain about everything “ruining” the way things were, and long for the days when tax evasion wasn’t needed and gasoline flowed like water. Isaac sees himself turning into something he cannot stand, proclaiming “I am so ignorant now, with all that I have learned.”
The song falls apart into controlled chaos, emerging with a time change, and firm, in-your-face guitar. The listener further steps into this persona of Isaac embodying a posh, old man, and delves into a first-person perspective. “I am invincible in these sunglasses… I am looking at you with my best eyes and I wish you could tell, I wish all of my kids would stop dressing up like Richard Hell. I am locked away in a high-tech wraparound translucent blue-tinted fortress and you cannot touch me. I am invincible in these sunglasses… there are so many roadmen on this street, and they cannot tell that I’m scared.” Here, sunglasses are used as a metaphor to depict how his girlfriend’s father views the working class. When wearing the sunglasses, you feel fear upon seeing “roadmen,” and put up a front of all-encompassing invincibility. You complain about how the younger generation doesn’t dress adequately, name-dropping Richard Hell, the bassist of the early punk outfit Television. Still, despite the blatant truth that the world has changed, you refuse to adapt, and clutch your pearls, hiding in your ivory tower.
Enough about Sunglasses, I could write a thesis on this song at this point.
Next on For The First Time is “Track X.” This song takes a different turn sonically. It’s soft and warm, with subtle violin, saxophone, and the same light guitar finger-picking reverberating between your ears. Lyrically, the track focuses on the vague concept of hope. Isaac details his contemplation of suicide, standing on the 18th floor of a building, drunk, thinking about jumping, all the while he recounts his unfinished business, such as proving his father wrong, and how those close to him would react to the grizzly sight. He decides to leave things open ended, the chorus stating “I guess, in some way-” this line acts like an unfinished interjection, indicating that there’s something worth living for, even if it means struggling for it. The title “Track X” itself indicates something unfinished, a placeholder to be revisited at another time. It alludes to the outcome of the song, wherein he has left the his fate open-ended, unfinished.
The final track on For The First Time is “Opus.” This song comes in with a somber set of duetting saxophones, building up into a syncopated minor key piece with polyrhythmic components. The excitement quickly dies down into the verse, but eventually picks back up with a fury of arpeggiating saxophones dueling for your attention. This song is a great example of the whiplash you can experience listening to Black Country, New Road. To be honest, I have never been an avid listener of “Opus,” but I can appreciate it for what it is.
The group is not afraid of experimentation, and I am excited to hear where their music will go next with this latest album. Black Country, New Road is resilient, and their ability to persevere is certainly indicative of their future success.
Growing up in Cleveland as a music fan was a stroke of luck, and I can proudly say it has long been a city with music at its heart. Home to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, countless live music venues and the newly launched Cuyahoga LIVE!, a county-led initiative aimed at strengthening the local music scene and supporting artists, Northeast Ohio stands out as a premier destination for live entertainment. One beloved venue, the Grog Shop, has been a staple of Cleveland’s West Side since the ’90s, hosting an impressive lineup of artists over the years, from Oasis to Wiz Khalifa. On March 30, the venue kept that legacy alive with Joe Brown Band, Late Arrival and Liam Brock, a surprising powerhouse lineup for a Sunday night.
Genre: Indie pop, dream pop, soft rock, subtle jazz Length: 14 tracks- 44min
There is a certain magic to Men I Trust’s music— an unhurried grace, an ability to create entire worlds out of whispered melodies and feather-light grooves. With Equus Asinus, the Montreal trio once again proves that subtlety is their greatest strength. Drifting effortlessly between indie, soft rock, and jazz influences, the album is a dreamscape bathed in muted pastels. A soundtrack for quiet contemplation and late-afternoon light filtering through half-open blinds.
This is a column on Polyvox mag dot com. The column is called Makeout Music, which is indicative of the contents. My name is Jenny Hanover. I’m usually a poet from Pittsburgh, PA. However, I double as a former college music director and kissing connoisseur, so I’m going to be breaking down some of the best albums to kiss to of all time.
Polyvox Magazine 