Get Through Your Day with Science Club’s Day Job

Philadelphia punk band Science Club released a fun, blistering album back in February. Day Job comes in at thirty minutes and is full of catchy hooks and some shorter songs played at breakneck speeds. The band is honest about the anxiety that comes with feeling like an uncool outcast, and they successfully transform those negative feelings into raw, sing-a-long tracks.

Science Club has a knack is for taking totally dismal thoughts and delivering in them in a way that is upbeat and lively. The album opener, “Another Cruddup Juggernaut,” contains lines like “I hate everybody who looks just like me / We’re part of the problem / Making it worse / The change that I don’t wan’t to be,” while the quick instrumentals and emphatic vocal deliveries stress the feeling of using music as therapy. Guitarist Nate Adams and bassist Nick Elmer share vocal duties, and do so with a satisfying mix of slowed-down melodies and rapid shouts. “Bad at Parties” and “Crazy Taxi” are so fast that the lyrics are hardly discernible, while tracks like “Selling Drugs in Union Square” stay a little more calm and composed.

Their most impressive moments come from merging their high speeds with emotional honesty. “Drunken Sleaze Party” calms down for emotionally revealing verses and speeds up for choruses and bridges that eventually find some resolution. Another standout track is “Bro Song,” where the band makes use of varied vocal styles, thumping bass and drum lines, and a piercing guitar riff. At times the guitars cut out to leave crashing drums and harsh vocals, while Adams eventually shreds through a guitar solo and the vocals turn into more obscure shouting. “RPGs” is a suitable wrap-up for the downright honest Day Job. Weaving in more clever instrumental work, the band reflects on their biggest hopes and fears. Their introspective yet goofy mindset leads to lines like “I’ve always been afraid of what was in the dark / Not in my room but what’s created in my heart / I’d rather have a fucking monster at my door than have to live with what I’m capable of anymore,” in a track that surrounds the topic of death and finding peace.

Science Club’s Day Job confronts their negative emotions in a pretty positive way. The band’s pent-up anger for the mundanity of everyday life is apparent in the lyrics, while the upbeat punk sounds and captivating hooks turn that hurt into something they can express while rocking out, presumably while laughing or with a smile on their face. Science Club is already working on their next release, which is shaping up to be a four song EP making its debut sometime in September.

Stream Day Job below or download on bandcamp. Catch Science Club this Thursday, July 16, at Philly Improv Theater (info).

 

Featured image via Facebook.