The momentous uprooting and relocation of an entire band from one city to another often shines through in their subsequent songwriting, and presents itself as a general growth as a group. Time to Go Home, the second album from Chastity Belt, is every bit indicative of such a move—260 plus miles interstate from Walla Walla, Washington to Seattle—with a sound that declares more confidence and self-knowledge than ever before.
The latest single off of the record, “Joke”, is a rather straightforward, boiled down tune of unspoken complexity. Discrete, but ever-present bass coasts on rails under bright guitar pickings and twangy leads in steady succession, all leading up to a key change that stings in latent beauty just before the song’s uplifting yet grim chorus, professing the forgetful escapism of drug induction: “Laugh so hard, then we cry / Let’s light everything on fire.” A lengthy instrumental outro caresses the pain of the lyrics away.
Time to Go Home will be released March 23 on Hardly Art. You can stream “Joke” below.
