Last night I was chilling in the weird industrial part of the south side of downtown Indy. This area is a hellscape made up of crumbling smokestacks, empty gravel lots, and abandoned factories. I’m hanging out outside one of these abandoned factories with my homeboy Lou; we’re crushing 40s and sending fist-sized chunks of gravel through the massive factory windows with our trusty baseball bat. I step up to bat, feet spread wide, hands dusted for extra grip, earbuds in, playing demos and yet unreleased songs from my inbox, when something comes on that causes me to lose focus and my grip, sending the bat flying right through the windshield of an old delivery truck. I guess the truck battery still had a little juice in it because the alarm started blaring, and before you know it, Lou and I are tearing ass out of there as several cop cars pull up to see what the fuss was about.
You may be thinking that that was a pretty big mistake I made over a song, and to that, good sir, madam, or they, I say, shut up. You may not be so quick to judge once you find out that that song was the new Skorts single “Bad Habit.”
Skorts may just be the best up-and-coming band I’ve stumbled upon this year. When I first came across their album “Incompletement,” it ruled my stereo for months, as I’m certain it did yours. These New York City-based rockers have a unique blend of alt and punk, of soft and sharp, of honey and cyanide, that quite simply drives me up the fucking wall. What we have here is a bit different, though.
We know that Skorts can rock a gentle ballad just as well as they can an explosive punk track. Look no further than “Steal the Night” for evidence of this. “Bad Habit,” however, takes things a step further than anything we’ve heard from the band thus far. The song is a back-and-forth between growling guitars, mellow beats, gentle garage-rock-inspired riffs, and bewitching vocals. Alli Walls, ladies, gentlemen, and everything in between, has the voice of a siren. Hypnotic does not even begin to cover it. It’s intoxicating, like a fat rip off a canister of whippets; it hits your head in seconds, and you’re swimming in a dreamy bliss that consumes your very soul. Backed up by the unparalleled guitar stylings of Char Smith, the funky bass lines provided by Emma Welch, and the beats—good Lord, the beats—which are laid down by Max Berdik and you have a lineup that makes something more than a band; you have a pantheon of musical Gods.
You can find “Bad Habit” streaming everywhere today. I’d tell you to stream it at your earliest convenience, but best be that you wait until you have nowhere to be for a few hours. Once you hear the track, you won’t be able to do anything but listen to it on repeat for the rest of the day. If that isn’t enough for you, then you’re in luck, as “Bad Habit” is a teaser track for the band’s upcoming EP “Muse and the Marquee.” The EP is out November 13th, so mark your calendars, people; this is not a drill. I’ll be patiently awaiting the release, with a pen in one hand and a baseball bat in the other, ready to review it. And I promise I won’t break any windshields this time, unless, of course, I really super want to.
