The first demo from Swearin' surfaced only in November, but it's hardly the case that the Brooklyn and Philadelphia-based group sprung from thin air. In the tight-knit, hook-oriented corner of the American punk underground where the band's co-songwriters, Allison Crutchfield and Kyle Gilbride, came to meet, the 23-year-old Crutchfield has already achieved cultish notoriety with her twin sister Katie for writing honest songs. Their Alabama-bred, 1990s-indebted pop-punk band P.S. Eliot (2007-2011), for which Katie wrote music and Allison played drums, were cherished by feminist punks who valued transparency and community over aesthetics. When P.S. Eliot disbanded last year-- because they'd "creatively accomplished everything [they] set out to and dragging [the band] out would be brazen and pointless," Katie said-- I had several friends travel hours to watch them perform one last time in Brooklyn. And at least one who cried.
While Katie's post-P.S. Eliot life has taken her toward stark, acoustic storytelling, muffling her sweet-sung words with lo-fi home-recordings, Allison has stepped up from behind the kit to deliver upbeat and fuzz-laden guitar pop on the self-recorded Swearin'. Moving between brittle guitar crunch and quiet lo-fi tunes, the album recalls the pace of Unrest's Perfect Teeth, but with re-readings of classic 90s indie à la Superchunk, Built to Spill, and the Breeders. Throughout Crutchfield's voice hints at the youthful candor of Amy Linton in Henry's Dress, or occasionally the bolder Anna Waronker of underrated 90s alt rockers that dog., while Kyle Gilbride (the two are a couple) offers bright Doug Martsch impressions. Although Swearin' looks beyond pop-punk toward something more distinct and considered, as a whole it still suggests writers who learned a thing or two about melodic punk poetry from Jawbreaker or the Promise Ring. The album's first cut, "1", conjures a sentiment of exploration: "I'm not satisfied with all of our instincts," Crutchfield sings, "I won't let it slide/ I will follow it."
Swearin' channels the feeling of being in your early-to-mid 20s in the most intuitive way: scrappy, snarky rock, unshakeable hooks, and genuine lyrics. On "Fat Chance" Crutchfield promises to leave home ("I'll move out of this house/ I will get my own place") and makes existential realizations ("Forever is a long time"); on "Hundreds and Thousands" she offers images of a hellish blue ocean, seedy motels, and dive bars before settling on moving east. Self-doubt and transience are recurring themes, and the acute details that permeate each song make them sound fit for only a small circle of friends (which is basically what's been going on for Swearin'). On mini-anthem "Movie Star", Crutchfield muses on one of young adulthood's most essential truths: "You and me don't earn much pay/ But you and me got enough to get away/ If we want to."
"Kenosha" is Crutchfield's best song here, making charming use of words like "precariously" and "malignant" before hitting the thoroughly impatient (and also ebullient) chorus: "I hope you like Kenosha so much you stay there forever, and we all lose touch," she sings, with a touch of evil. It's a forthright, cutting sentiment that affirms Crutchfield's stance as an eloquent lyrical fighter, one she began to set with "What a Dump", a demo track about street harassment and "and how much it sucks" that is regretfully absent from the album.
Gilbride can also be exceptionally poignant, with a habit of singing specific verses that conclude on brilliantly resonant lines. "Here to Hear", in particular, conveys a real sense of post-college disorientation and uncertainty. "Moving back here/ Feeling too self aware," he sings, emotively. "I keep thinking/ Is this as good as it gets?" Elsewhere he sounds pissed off (the rocket-fire "Crashing"), and his guitar solos, though accomplished, also show restraint. On the soft-strummed downer ballad "Empty Head", he sounds like J Mascis without the mountains of noise: "It's sad to want it back/ My time again/ It's not like anything was better then." For a record that on the surface seems characterized by its outpouring of energy, it's beguiling to find that the saddest Swearin' song is also one of its most memorable.
A sappy verse-trading love song seems inevitable for Swearin'; the immensely hooky "Just" works due in no small part to Crutchfield and Gilbride's ability to paint evocative images. Crutchfield recounts sticky skin and streetlights and a first encounter with love, and later her internal musings are matched by Kyle's simultaneous self-loathing: "I came in empty and I broke the lock/ It's dark around me/ Overslept and I'm alone a lot/ No one's asking." It feels like a film that flips between scenes. For all the parallels to twee pop of the 1990s, and the many bands who have drawn similar indie rock reference points in recent years, Swearin' favors direct expression over style, something Crutchfield articulates early on "Fat Chance": "An artist's mind is stimulated by the aesthetic/ And I don't know about art/ But I think your music's shit." That line could alienate some listeners, but it's refreshing to find a group that sounds sincerely as though it's got nothing to hide.
