A Salve for Institution by The Sheaves

Punk in its original iteration requires some kind of empowerment, some sense that enough fist wagging and teeth brandishing will hit mainstream culture with a thermonuclear existential freakout, forcing an awakening so painful as to effect immediate, sweeping social change. The mainstream vaporized, our confidence decomposed, our enemies multiplied; the only honest path forward for punk lies in the teeth-chattering anxiety of A Salve for Institution by The Sheaves. Lyrical messages arrive by way of mumbled chatter, guitar riffs meekly teeter off tonal balance, and warm chords extinguish their own spark before they even light. Here, punk rock feels dim, snarled, overgrown, trading its red-faced screaming with a downturned head, chuckling softly out of neutral lips and lightless eyes. Power disperses infinitely into a web of seemingly competing factions that together prop up an entity invisible, intangible, all-knowing, and invincible. All organized resistance enters the web; all energy supports the beast. The only response is non-response, a snicker with averted eyes.