Monday 1/18: Squitch—"Pretty Boy"
Today, we share our thoughts on a new song by the Boston indie-rock band Squitch.
Welcome to Endless Scroll, the brainchild of Eli Enis (he/him) and Eric Bennett (they/them). Since Feb. 2019, we’ve been a weekly podcast about music, the internet, and where those two things intersect. Now we’re, also a M-F newsletter about songs. Our format is simple: a link to a song and a short take from each of us about what we think of it. Each day of the week has a corresponding genre: Monday is indie, Tuesday is punk, Wednesday is hip-hop, Thursday is pop, and Friday is misc.
Today, we share our thoughts on a new song by the Boston indie-rock band Squitch.
Squitch—"Pretty Boy"
Eric Bennett:
There are a lot of great songs on Squitch’s new album. The Boston band released Learn to Be Alone, a record whose title echoes what many of us had to do in 2020, on the year's last day. It’s full of raucous, angular guitar that makes me think of many other great Boston rockers like Pile or (early) Speedy Ortiz. Perhaps my favorite is the plucky, winding “Pretty Boy.” It’s one of the record’s more subdued moments but is catchy and full of fits and starts. January is a month that I dread as it makes me feel trapped, and it’s when I finally start to tire of gray skies. The chorus of “Pretty Boy” is something I’ve been reflecting on, with its description of escaping the confines of one's mind. It feels anxious and zoned out, but is still full of almost trance-like rhythm. It makes me think of so many bands I’ve seen play basements while awkwardly bobbing my head, PBR in hand. I await the day I can do so while seeing Squitch.
Eli Enis:
It’s cool how even though the internet has done so much to globalize music scenes—specifically in the west—there are still pockets where regional sounds are salient as ever. In 2021 there really are no distinguishing features of a “Brooklyn indie-rock” band, but Boston is still breeding indie groups who sound inextricably connected from the city’s last decade of sounds. Squitch’s wiry, wobbly, muttery, sorta mathy indie-rock is explicitly reminiscent of the bands Eric mentioned, but I’ll also throw early Palehound, Ovlov, and the more melodic Kal Marks songs into this specific reference pool. “Pretty Boy” isn’t my favorite song on this record (“Rut” probably is) and I can’t say that this style excites me today the way it did in 2016, but Squitch are tight and I’m glad the torch is being passed.