Can’t repeat the past? Why, of course you can! BEAT AWFULS “PAWS”

In 2017 Alan Cross wrote about the 30-Year nostalgia cycle. He said, 

“There’s a reason that the culture of the 1980s is experiencing a resurgence right now. Just as there’s a reason that we’re in the early days of getting more build-up of 90’s nostalgia. …The pattern is this: pop culture is forever obsessed with a nostalgia pendulum that regularly resurfaces things from 30 years ago. There are a number of reasons why the nostalgia pendulum shows up, but the driving factor seems to be that it takes about 30 years for a critical mass of people who were consumers of culture when they were young to become the creators of culture in their adulthood.”

Well, that building-up of 90s nostalgia is on full display with Beat Awfuls and their new album PAWS.  It was told to me in the press release accompanying the record, Dave Vicini (the band’s founder and songwriter) is a big fan of The Breeders, The Velvet Underground, and Violent Femmes, which continues to track for that idea. Also, in those notes, “These songs are meant to linger, seductive like a pop hook, all while Vicini explores themes of disaffection, drug dependency and the realities of late-stage capitalism.” Which is not unlike the music and lyrical themes of many of those 90s rock bands. 

There are solid tracks on this record. Lyrically and musically. The guitar sounds, vocal deliveries, and the head-rocking, shoulder-swaying melodies take me back to those alt-rock days. Beat Awfuls’ (Allison Apperson, Russell Lacy, Kelly Queener, and Dave Vicini) PAWS, an acronym for “Post-Acute Withdrawal Syndrome, is good. I like it. It swarms me in a warm and welcomed nostalgia. I recommend it. So, grab your best plaid. Lace-up those doc martens, and give this record a spin.