Album review: Grumpster – Fever Dream

A band called Grumpster seem predestined to put smiles on faces with songs about their heavy hearts. This Oakland trio do not disappoint. Picking up where they left off with 2019 debut Underwhelmed, second album Fever Dream isn’t interested in emo wallowing; it’s desperate to burn away its internal darkness across a collection of melodic punk nuggets drenched in syrup and slingshotted into the sun.

‘It feels like there's poison in my bones and blood,’ confesses vocalist/bassist Donnie Walsh on the opening title-track. ‘A darkness floods my head sometimes / I'm paralysed from things unseen / From deep inside of me.’ Meanwhile drummer Noel Agante and guitarist Lalo Gonzalez Deetz deliver the kind of springy late-’90s / early-2000s musical backdrop that, back in the day, might’ve enlivened a tale of woe about high-school heartache, or being grounded when you want to go to the hottest party in town.

Although the Bay Area’s iconic 924 Gilman scene is listed as a reference-point, Grumpster’s influences feel far further flung. Crash delivers its poignant chorus (‘It’s dark inside / Any time I close my eyes’) with enough defiant, soul-swelling aplomb to feel very Nirvana. There’s something of Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo in the deceptively simplistic wordplay and straining high-notes of Better Than Dead. The brilliant Looking Good delivers big old-school Alkaline Trio vibes.

Yet, Grumpster are carving out an identity that’s very much their own. With Anti-Flag’s Chris #2 on production duty, the 10 tracks here – only two of which exceed the three-minute mark – slip by in a fittingly feverish blur, riding the line between ramshackle charm and ear-pleasing high sheen. And, by the time poundingly bittersweet sort-of love song I Wouldn’t Dream Of It spills into hauntingly fuzzed-up closer Spiders, it’s hard not to be captivated by the possibility of what comes next.

Verdict: 3/5

For fans of: Anti-Flag, Weezer, The Starting Line

Fever Dream is out now via Pure Noise