One of the most important aspects of the rise of punk rock is it gave a voice to a lot of people who would not have one in the music industry's big leagues -- the un-pretty ordinary people who have something to say and an interesting way to say it might not have found a place on the stage of an arena or at the offices of a major label, but in a dumpy club and a cheap recording studio they could work magic.
Jeff Rosenstock
is just that sort of guy, and if his anger and anxiety are rooted in the concerns of an ordinary man, it means they're powerfully relatable, and he knows how to come up with a hooky, punky melody, can bash a guitar pretty well, and has no trouble releasing his emotions in front of a microphone. With albums like 2016's
Worry.
, 2018's
Post-
, and 2020's
No Dream
, he's won the devoted (if not massive) following he deserves. Like plenty of other regular guys, the events of the year 2020 onward (global pandemic, political chaos, weather-related disasters) were weighing heavy on
Rosenstock
's mind, and 2023's
HELLMODE
is full of superior punk rock ranting as he tries to make sense of it all. In his song "Doubt," he says, "Kill all the doubt or the doubt is never gonna go away," which is clearly good advice though it's a bit hard to pull off, and even on songs like "Healmode" and "Life Admin," which musically play to his sunny and melodic side,
has a hard time being comfortable with happiness, and while it doubtless makes life stressful for him, it's great for his muse, and
is loaded with great songs, whether he's struggling with the world around him while cranking up the tempo ("I Wanna Be Wrong"), pleading for love in pop-punk style ("Will U Still U"), or wrapping up the set with an epic tale of real life tribulations ("3 Summers'').
and his usual studio partner
Jack Shirley
wanted to up the production values for this LP, and
was recorded at EastWest Studio in Los Angeles, a fancy-pants facility where everyone from
Elvis Presley
to
the Beach Boys
Madonna
U2
have recorded.
and
Shirley
were clearly not going for slickness as much as clarity and a big, powerful sound, and that's what they got -- this is
's best-sounding record to date, and in terms of songwriting, performances, and passion, he and everyone on board brought their A game. In the great tradition of punk rock heroes,
might seem ordinary to a lot of folks, but not many folks have the talent and the vision to pull off an album as good as
, and it ranks with his finest work. ~ Mark Deming