Description
On their eponymous debut, the Dallas-based BAD STUFF (featuring members of the critically acclaimed True Widow) aims to deliver one of 2026's most engrossing and cinematic slow-burning rock records.
The band's alternative, almost Lynchian take on the genre is palpable from the onset of the album opener, "Sullen": Nicole Estill's bare kick-snare rhythm makes way to contemplative, laid-back guitar and bass twangs from DH Phillips and Laura Hartman, churning into an ebb and flow alongside moody keys and a cool, almost-funereal vocal delivery from Jackie Dunn Smith. What follows feels like a journey across fuzzed-out passages of surreal, dreamy introspection.
Elsewhere on the album, the glossiness of a song title like "Summer Girls" is offset by a creeping, repeating guitar and bass riff that builds and builds as the lyrics explore melancholy:
"Summer girls only cry in their dark rooms
Summer girl keep their faces dry
To remain unseen means to survive
Affection traps, affection dies."
Immediately after, "The Invisible Man" offers a first-hand account of dejection: a loss of love as told by Phillips and vocalist Gabriel Spatz - "an analgesic marriage - born of boredom and fear." In contrast, tracks like Nepenthe simply explode with fuzzed-out bass at the forefront, chugging along heavy, borderline sludgey riffs.
Through these stories and atmosphere, the darkness and mystery steeped in Bad Stuff can feel all-too real.
FFO: The Cramps, Nick Cave, True Widow, Lungfish, Gun Club, X
Tracklist:
- 1 Sullen
- 2 Gruesome
- 3 Summer Girls
- 4 Invisible Man
- 5 Creator
- 6 Hush 1
- 7 Nepenthe
- 8 Hush 2
- 9 Human Crush
- 10 Work of Art
UPC: 781676759316
Label: Relapse
Release Date: 6.5.26
Format: Vinyl
![the album cover for Bad Stuff - Bad Stuff [Pink]](http://tumbleweedsct.com/cdn/shop/files/4509623-3569289.jpg?v=1776177441)
![the album cover for Bad Stuff - Bad Stuff [Pink]](http://tumbleweedsct.com/cdn/shop/files/4509623-3569289.jpg?crop=center&height=430&v=1776177441&width=310)