Social Lubrication

フェミニストの怒りとスパイス・ガールズのアティテュードが炸裂するUKガール・バンドの3RD!
アート・スクール出身のラケル・ミョル(Vo.)、アリス・ゴー(Gt.)、ベラ・ポドパデック(Ba.)による3人組ガールズ・パンク・バンドDREAM WIFE。 アート・スクールのパフォーマンスとしてバンドが結成され、持ち曲が数曲という状態でカナダ/欧州ツアーを敢行したという根っからのDIY娘たち。 2020年リリース作『SO WHENYOU GONNA...』も高い評価を得た彼女たちが待望の3RDフル・アルバムをリリース!
ビキニ・キルやESGといったバンドを引き合いに語られるパンキッシュなサウンドと彼女らが敬愛するというマドンナを感じさせる80'Sグラマラスな雰囲気がクラッシュしたサウンドは本作でも健在。
「フェミニストの怒りとスパイス・ガールズのアティテュードが炸裂するガール・バンド」との表現も納得でしかないグラマラスなロックンロール満載のニューアルバムとなっています!

Dream Wife enjoyed a critical and commercial peak with their 2020 breakthrough album So When You Gonna… that most notably included a place in the Top 20 of the U.K. Albums chart. However, the albums release during the darkest days of the COVID-19 global pandemic meant a piece of their success was missing: Alice Go, Rakel Mjoll, and Bella Podpadec couldnt tour in support of So When You Gonna… the way they wanted to. Instead, they channeled that raw energy into their next album. Produced by Go and mixed by Alan Moulder and Caesar Edmunds (who have worked with Dream Wife heroes like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and contemporaries like Wet Leg), Social Lubrication puts the trios rock first. While they didnt exactly downplay their heavy side on So When You Gonna…, they may have rounded off its edges a bit, making the onslaught of tracks like the fittingly named opening salvo "Kick in the Teeth" that much more potent. From its feedback and whomping kick drums to Mjolls knife-edged vocals, its the perfect expression of Social Lubrications unapologetic stance. Dream Wife are more confidently plain-spoken than ever before in calling out injustices, oppressors, and passive bystanders. That includes themselves and their listeners on "Who Do You Wanna Be?," a crash course in leftist politics and a reminder that actions speak louder than words with the urging refrain "If not you/Then who?/If not now/Then when?" Though they deliver advice with their trademark sense of humor on the Bikini Kill-esque "Hot (Dont Date a Musician)" -- which makes sure to include the "hot theys in bands" as well as the hot girls and boys -- it doesnt override the old-school punk feeling of calls to arms on Social Lubrication. Nowhere is this clearer than on the title tracks churning litany of sexist moments big and small ("Whats it like to be a woman in music, dear?/Youd never ask me that if you saw me as a peer") or on "Leech," a frank, harrowing takedown of music industry parasites that speaks for generations of female and non-binary artists when Mjoll implores "just have some fucking empathy" in a voice thats alternately infuriated and exhausted. Though Dream Wife spends most of the album fighting the good fight, they round out Social Lubrication with love songs that pack just as much of a punch. The sweetly scuzzy romance of "Mascara" and innocent debauchery of "Curious" build on the flair for open-hearted guitar pop they showed on their last album, but "Honestly"s seductive dream pop reveals entirely new realms of their sound. Its just another example of how Dream Wifes success has made them the opposite of complacent: The more acclaim they get, the louder they shout about injustice and the farther they push their boundaries. Social Lubrication is the work of a band that believes music can actually make a difference, and in Dream Wifes hands, its a feeling thats contagious. ~ Heather Phares