Getting forced to play little league baseball is about as emo as youthful tribulations get. I imagine Joe Sutkowski—who appears in full uniform on the cover of Dirt Buyer III, the third album from his emo recording project Dirt Buyer—as one of those kids who picked dandelions in right field and maybe attempted to swing at three pitches all season. Being coerced into recreational activities against your will suggests a unique type of loneliness—for Sutkowski, one that represents emotional trials far deeper than just an unhappy season in dusty cleats. “Baseball is somethin’ I’ll never get/But I sleep on it/Wake up and try again,” he sings on opener “Baseball,” which relays the idea into an album-spanning theme about isolation and childhood angst.
Originally envisioned as a fake band, Dirt Buyer have been searching for an identity to call their own since their 2019 self-titled debut. Sutkowski hasn’t quite circled the bases, but he’s getting closer. Emerging from a stormy period in Sutkowski’s life, III’s blend of emo, slowcore, and folk works great as a cathartic emotional exercise thanks to its visceral themes and weighty sound, even though the record seldom adds anything new to an ever-evolving emo canon.
III is best at its heaviest, when traumatic tales drowned in waves of distortion and instrumental layering are surrounded by subdued passages that bridge their corrosive cores. “Bullshit Fuck” frontloads its grating guitars and percussion as Sutkowski delivers a wearied rant, and its second half simmers out into an introspective instrumental befitting the comedown after a venting session. “Me Before You” is the exact opposite: Its spacey guitar refrains underline a story of conflicted emotions (“I wanna make it right/But I don’t think I can stomach it this time”) that slowly builds towards an abrasive and decisive finale (“I don’t need you/I don’t wanna make it right/I think I can stomach it this time”).
But some songs are hollow to a fault. The meandering drum machine base of “Old as Sin” never quite builds to anything more substantial, and it sticks out against the raw drums on the rest of the album. The naked guitars of “Multizeal” offer a melodic break from the pounding intensity, but the song suffers from a final build that teases a climactic finale yet peters out with nothing to show for it. More melodic variation might have elevated these more reserved passages; Sutkowski’s pull-no-punches songwriting usually isn’t enough to shoulder the weight on its own.
As a folky slowcore album discussing childhood woes with straightforward but descriptive songwriting, III doesn’t do much to break away from its obvious influences, chief among them Mark Kozelek. Some songs build from Sutkowski’s inspirations and even improve upon them, but others wear them a bit too prominently on their sleeves. The trodding pace of “Wait on the World” is right out of the Red House Painters playbook, and Sutkowski’s great vocal performance gives it a brand new shellac, shifting from low hums to high hollers that convey a vivid sense of distress. “For Me,” though, doesn’t do much to sound like anything other than a heavier “Carry Me Ohio,” flipping the main riff and thematic structure of Kozelek’s classic into a distracting imitation.
Closer “When You Were a Kid” is a fitting amalgamation of everything Dirt Buyer should be. Its descriptively blunt autobiographical accounts of palpable angst start off reserved—but never boring—and slowly blossom into an explosive finish. You feel everything Sutkowski wanted you to hear throughout the 10 songs before it, both in its songwriting and the way its sound conveys its themes. This is a hint of the identity Sutkowski is searching for, and he finds it right as he steps off the field and into the dugout.
