Album Premiere: Sensual World—’Feeling Wild’
Posted: by The Editor
Sensual World‘s aptly-titled debut, Feeling Wild, is an exceptionally refreshing take on post-punk. Rather than leaning into the broader genre’s dancier, cleaner side (a la Priests, Protomartyr, Parquet Courts), the Richmond, VA band jerk the wheel and careen dangerously into snarling post-hardcore and thumping punk music. Bashing drums, dingy basslines, jagged guitar tones, and vocalist Julie Karr’s drawly howl are the basic components of each of the eight songs, and it truly never gets tiring to hear them build and break ’em down.
The quartet have a really fine ear for dynamics, knowing just when to pull back the guitars to emphasize a slicing bassline. Or when to drown the chorus pedal-doused leads with crushing distortion and ride out a motoring groove with punchy power-chords. Whereas post-punk in its purest form can easily become repetitive in its tautness, Sensual World are never able to outrun their clear hardcore/fast-punk influences, which is a huge asset. Feeling Wild is genuinely exciting, raw, loud, and profoundly tight from beginning to end, and that’s virtually impossible to achieve going into the genre’s fourth decade of existence. But Sensual World fuckin’ did it.
Stream Feeling Wild below ahead of its release 9/27:
Feeling Wild is out 9/27 via Stupid Bag Records. LP pre-orders are available here.
The band will be touring the East Coast this October:
10/4 Durham, NC @ Motorco
10/5 Greenville, NC
10/6 Atlanta, GA
10/7 Nashville, TN @ Tempo
10/8 St. Louis, MO @ The Nest
10/9 Bloomington, IN
10/10 Chicago, IL
10/11 Cincinnati, OH
10/12 Pittsburgh, PA
10/13 Philadelphia, PA
—
Eli Enis | @eli_enis
The Alternative is ad-free and 100% supported by our readers. If you’d like to help us produce more content and promote more great new music, please consider donating to our Patreon page, which also allows you to receive sweet perks like free albums and The Alternative merch.
