new music: black kids return after 10 years with the hook-filled ‘rookie’ a new synth pop ode to teenage heartbreak #soundcheck

It doesn’t re-write the book so much as add a new chapter belatedly, sort of like the George RR Martin of synth pop. The band’s hallmarks are all there: shoutalong choruses, vintage synths, dance beats, charmingly awkward songs of teenage heartbreak, and lead singer Reginald Youngblood’s perpetual ode to The Cure. Though there’s nothing quite as gloriously hook-filled as “Dance,” a few of the songs come dangerously close, like the title track, lead single “In a Song,” and “IFFY.” But most striking is the band’s biggest deviation from their trademark sound, “Obligatory Drugs” which sounds a bit like if Depeche Mode had been hired to write a late 80’s anti-drug PSA. Prior to this weekend that’s not a thing I knew I needed in my life, but what is teenage heartbreak if not an opportunity to grow or something. I for one, welcome the return of our synth pop overlords.

By Nathan Leigh, AFROPUNK contributor