Release Date: 28/11/25
Parquet Courts – Light Up Gold Little was said about Parquet Courts' debut effort, American Specialties. Released exclusively on cassette tape, the quasi-album was an odd collection of 4-track recordings that left those who were paying attention wanting more. A year of woodshedding live sets passed before the Courts committed another song to tape. The band's first proper LP, Light Up Gold, is a dynamic and diverse foray into the back alleys of the American DIY underground. Bright guitars swirl serpentine over looping, groovy post-punk bass lines and drums that border on robotic precision. While the initial rawness of the band's early output remains, the songwriting has gracefully evolved. Primary wordsmiths A. Savage and Austin Brown combine for a dynamic lyrical experience—one part an erudite overflow of ideas, the other an exercise in laid-back observation. Lyrically dense, the poetry is in how it flows along with the melody, often as locked-in as the rhythm section. Recorded over a few days in an ice-box practice space, Light Up Gold is equally indebted to Krautrock, The Fall, and contemporaries like Tyvek and Eddy Current Suppression Ring. Though made up of Texan transplants, Parquet Courts are a New York band. Light Up Gold is a conscious effort to draw from the rich culture of the city—the bands like Sonic Youth, Bob Dylan, and the Velvet Underground that are not from New York, but of it. A panoramic landscape of dilapidated corner stores and crowded apartments is superimposed over bare-bones Americana, leaving little room for romance or sentiment. It's punk, it's American, it's New York... it's the color of something you were looking for. Parquet Courts – Tally All The Things You Broke EP Tally All The Things That You Broke is far more than a stopgap in between full-lengths; it’s the sound of Parquet Courts stretching out. Opener “You’ve Got Me Wonderin’ Now,” with its melodic drive and persistent Flutophone running alongside the melody, balances the manic tendencies of “Descend (The Way),” which would have fit on Light Up Gold, and extended rager “The More It Works,” which would fit in a live set between Tyvek and Eddy Current Suppression Ring. “Fall On Yr Face” presents a classic desert trawler, lopsided and tuneful—the sound of the end of a long day. But the day is just beginning for the protagonist of “He’s Seein’ Paths,” junkyard drum loops and doorbell samples framing Andrew Savage’s eight-minute stream-of-consciousness rap about the trials and tribulations of a marijuana delivery service representative, zipping around the city on his bike. Simultaneously the link between Parquet Courts and Ween, or Parquet Courts and Beck, it frames the band coming from a new place, and is a post-millenial NYC anthem—quintessential sounds for anyone who’s ever waited in anticipation of dialing that number, or anyone who’s put on their game face and rode from point A to point B in the snarl of vicious traffic. Parquet Courts remain Austin Brown, A. Savage, Sean Yeaton and M. Savage. They’ve toured everywhere this year and will continue to do so.
Parquet Courts – Light Up Gold Little was said about Parquet Courts' debut effort, American Specialties. Released exclusively on cassette tape, the quasi-album was an odd collection of 4-track recordings that left those who were paying attention wanting more. A year of woodshedding live sets passed before the Courts committed another song to tape. The band's first proper LP, Light Up Gold, is a dynamic and diverse foray into the back alleys of the American DIY underground. Bright guitars swirl serpentine over looping, groovy post-punk bass lines and drums that border on robotic precision. While the initial rawness of the band's early output remains, the songwriting has gracefully evolved. Primary wordsmiths A. Savage and Austin Brown combine for a dynamic lyrical experience—one part an erudite overflow of ideas, the other an exercise in laid-back observation. Lyrically dense, the poetry is in how it flows along with the melody, often as locked-in as the rhythm section. Recorded over a few days in an ice-box practice space, Light Up Gold is equally indebted to Krautrock, The Fall, and contemporaries like Tyvek and Eddy Current Suppression Ring. Though made up of Texan transplants, Parquet Courts are a New York band. Light Up Gold is a conscious effort to draw from the rich culture of the city—the bands like Sonic Youth, Bob Dylan, and the Velvet Underground that are not from New York, but of it. A panoramic landscape of dilapidated corner stores and crowded apartments is superimposed over bare-bones Americana, leaving little room for romance or sentiment. It's punk, it's American, it's New York... it's the color of something you were looking for. Parquet Courts – Tally All The Things You Broke EP Tally All The Things That You Broke is far more than a stopgap in between full-lengths; it’s the sound of Parquet Courts stretching out. Opener “You’ve Got Me Wonderin’ Now,” with its melodic drive and persistent Flutophone running alongside the melody, balances the manic tendencies of “Descend (The Way),” which would have fit on Light Up Gold, and extended rager “The More It Works,” which would fit in a live set between Tyvek and Eddy Current Suppression Ring. “Fall On Yr Face” presents a classic desert trawler, lopsided and tuneful—the sound of the end of a long day. But the day is just beginning for the protagonist of “He’s Seein’ Paths,” junkyard drum loops and doorbell samples framing Andrew Savage’s eight-minute stream-of-consciousness rap about the trials and tribulations of a marijuana delivery service representative, zipping around the city on his bike. Simultaneously the link between Parquet Courts and Ween, or Parquet Courts and Beck, it frames the band coming from a new place, and is a post-millenial NYC anthem—quintessential sounds for anyone who’s ever waited in anticipation of dialing that number, or anyone who’s put on their game face and rode from point A to point B in the snarl of vicious traffic. Parquet Courts remain Austin Brown, A. Savage, Sean Yeaton and M. Savage. They’ve toured everywhere this year and will continue to do so.