For many, living in a city means having an apartment but never finding yourself there, simply because there’s so much outside of it. It’s a full embrace of the nightlife, and a rebellion against the sunrise, and, perhaps most notably, an inebriated daze. The members of Cheena, the supergroup of New York City’s punk underground—consisting of members of Crazy Spirit, Hank Wood & The Hammerheads, and Pharmakon, herself—all seem to understand this mentality, and feed it directly into their brand of rock ’n’ roll sludge.
“Car,” the first single off their debut LP titled, Spend the Night With…, is a bottom-feeding cruiser riddled with the anxious droning of downstrokes and palm-mutes, a riling bassline, the madness broken by sudden swirls of Logan Montana’s slide guitar and Walker Behl’s contemptible vocals. The song pushes forward in a way that there’s no going back, like one hit too many of an amphetamine, and you’re left with no choice but to ride it out, coated in that layer of filth left on a pair of jeans after a night out, the city’s grime seeping from clothing onto skin, to the inner core, and finally, the psyche. Oh, but none of this in any bad way. It becomes a part of you, and vice versa. Though it does leave a question, as Behl probes deploringly, “Why can’t I ever stay at home?”
Spend the Night With… is out August 5 on Sacred Bones.
