On Twerp Verse, Speedy Ortiz accelerate the band's idiosyncrasy through the wilderness of Dupuis' heady reflections on sex, lies and audiotape while adding surprising textures like Linn drums and whirled guitar processing to their off-kilter hooks. Dupuis, whose electropop solo project Sad13 debuted in 2016 shortly after her own move to Philadelphia, has become more instinctive in her songwriting - her home-recorded demos mirror Twerp Verse's songs in a closer way than any other Speedy record. The band's camaraderie and crate-digging is evident, with diffuse reference points like Squeeze, Hop Along, Prince, Paramore, and Brenda Lee being sucked into the band's chaos. Even when Dupuis sings of alienation and political weariness, the pop maelstrom swirling around her provides a defiantly charged, mussed-but-hooky optimism.
"You need to employ a self-preservational sense of humor to speak truth in an increasingly baffling world," says Dupuis on the album title Twerp Verse. "I call it a ‘twerp verse' when a musician guests on a track and says something totally outlandish – like a Lil Wayne verse – but it becomes the most crucial part. I like ‘twerp’ as a diss, but in this meaning, the twerp is doing a service--shaking things up by being bold, not complacent, never silent.” Tuned smartly to the political opacity of the present, Twerp Verse rings clear as a bell.
Release: April 27th, 2018, Carpark Records
Words: Carpark/Stop Start