W.S. Walcott Medicine Show

Gladie – “Car Alarm”

There’s nothing like waking up on a Tuesday morning and being surprised by a new release which was totally unexpected. This is exactly what transpired this morning as Philadelphia stalwarts, Gladie dropped “Car Alarm”, a noisey guitar driven banger. Produced by none other than Jeff Rosentsock, “Car Alarm” finds lead singer, songwriter and guitarist Augusta “Gus” Koch and Matt Schimelfenig (guitar and background vox), the mainstays of Gladie rocking harder and louder than we’ve heard from the band in quite some time.

A hard driving song that appears to be a paeon to the mundacities, frustrations and ironies of everyday life when taken at face value, but with lines like:

“COMPLAINING ABOUT THE TRAFFIC
WHEN I’M PART OF IT
LOOKING FOR THE PROBLEM
WHEN I’M THE ONE WHO STARTED IT.
EVERY DAY I WAKE UP THE SAME”

One can’t help but feel that Koch and company are actually venting about the state of present day society where there is so little accountability for the things around us that are broken, not to mention some of our political leaders who thrive on creating problems in our lives so that they can then lay claim for fixing the problems that they in fact created.

All in all, this is one hell of a tune and I really hope that it’s the first of many singles to come.

*Of special note, kudos to Gus for the Kim Shatuck like shriek which we get about midway through the song after the repeated lines “I THOUGHT WE KNEW BETTER BY NOW”.