Psychic Teens - Teen LP

First release for Golden Voyage records is this LP from the Philly based Psychic Teens, simply titled Teen. As the big heart with an “X” through it would indicate, this isn’t exactly your feel good record. This one rides the 80’s goth/darkwave era hard, but with a bit more added noise and distortion that will likely draw mentions of influence from shoegaze, etc. The singer especially seems to really be following the Joy Division line of approach, with cold monotone echoed out vocals. They seem to go back and forth with each track as far as ramping up the noise factor goes. The lead track “YUNG” serves well in getting things started and is no doubt one of the highlights, aside from the opening “Surrender” riff that pulls me away from it some. However, towards the end of the track it turns into a claustrophobic mess of noise that seems to be about the heaviest moment on the record actually. Other than on a track like “ARM”, this bit of thick nastiness doesn’t really reappear and instead more so follows a similar path that bands like Ceremony and Screen Vinyl Image are also exploring by wiring together big melodies, treble heavy noise, and ample amounts of goth influence. That’s a bit of competition right there, and there is certainly more than that out there currently, but from what I’m hearing on Teen they stand to elbow their way past a few.

Psychic Teens – YUNG [MP3]

Anyone that is interested in picking up Teen can do so by hitting up the Golden Voyage webstore or Bandcamp if digital is your thing.