BETTER

What do you get when you ply rock 'n' roll drums, years of industry experience and award-winning songwriting with a powerhouse vocalist? Something even better than it seems. Toronto-based rock trio Altered by Mom have been kicking out hook-heavy tunes for the better part of the last decade, and their newly released debut album Better finds all their teeth-cutting culminating in a body of work that is simultaneously fresh and nostalgic. Billed as "chaos with a party vibe" (a lyric borrowed from their viral lead single "OK OK"), the band deliver on that promise by offering up endless positivity on a record that still manages to remain rooted in reality. Front-loaded with additional teaser tracks "Knee-High Sox" and "Sucking on a Lemon," the album signals the band's aesthetic pivot from 2023's AHEM EP, which found them in the early phase of taking the project from pandemic-era streaming to live stages across the world. For Better, ABM crank the hooky dance track meter to 11 on the aforementioned front-half songs, while still leaving room for sentimental slow burners like album highlight "Even Better" and "Better How You Are" (anyone else noticing a theme?).In their live crowds, ABM have been known to draw comparisons to fellow Canadians Len for their catchier sensibilities, blink-182 for their balls-to-the-wall riffs, and Monowhales for their prismatic attitudes (I've even felt pangs that form a Moffatts-shaped silhouette in my tween heart from time to time); but on record, they morph into something entirely their own — a group laser-focused on the silver linings, love for one another and leaving sonic spaces stamped with smiling faces, all without a trace of skepticism. "Sucking on a Lemon" is the perfect home for that notion, wherein the band chastise a stand-in sourpuss ("THE MAN") who seeks to harsh the vibe for the sake of maintaining his own cool points. The antidote, obviously, is submitting to the call to dance along. Committed to improvement on "Wasted" and "Queen of My Mental Health," ABM continue to make lemonade, while "High Rise" reaches for the stars with its dreamy, chant-along lyrics and infectious flute-driven hook courtesy of guitarist Devon Lougheed's former Hey Ocean! bandmate Ashleigh Ball. Meticulously mixed and thoughtfully arranged, Better finds Altered by Mom at a new peak — from which you may never be able to look down again. Cynics need not offer an ounce of their party-pooping; Altered by Mom will win you over, whether you like it or not.