Kick Evrything
Stay In/Slow Now (Party Hat)

If you think the title of Stay In/Slow Now means that Kick Evrything has mellowed since releasing its debut album last fall, that misconception will be dispelled the instant you hit Play. The 11-song collection kicks off with “Motion Man”, an unsettling mix of squalling electronics and computerized beats, over which singer Casey Wei gasps and howls like the art-school spawn of Karen O.

Things only pick up from there: “Winter Feet” begins with a quirky disco boogie before exploding into jagged start-stop breakdowns, while “Patience (Just Might Hurt You)” transforms from a tuneful, mid-tempo rocker into a yelping freak-out in barely a minute and a half. Even better is the dance-floor-ready “Wanna Do”, which sets hypnotic mantras like “It didn’t work/Big deal” against a kraut-rocking minimalist pulse.

While Kick Evrything’s early recordings were a mixed bag of stylistic mashups and stream-of-consciousness experimentation, Stay In/Slow Now favours songcraft over eclectic sonics: the band mostly sticks to angular, keyboard-heavy postpunk, meaning that the album sounds like a cohesive whole instead of an assortment of demos.

Still, this newfound sense of purpose doesn’t mean that Kick Evrything has lost its sense of adventure. “We Most Certainly” eschews raucous noise for gentle synth blips and Wei’s restrained coo, her voice scarcely above a whisper as she sings, “I’m here hiding/Come find me.” Meanwhile, “1955” is effectively chilly mope rock, its ghostly breakdown evoking Radiohead or Liars at their most gloomy. Winners like these show that, for this vowel-omitting trio, focused songwriting is even more exciting than oddball experimentation.