The New Lows – I Couldn’t Sleep

The New Lows are the Netflix of the music world.

You hop onto Netflix when you want to be entertained – you won’t get all the summer blockbusters nor the Oscar award winners; but no matter what style you like, Netflix has a little bit of everything for you and you’ll be able to happily waste a few hours watching TV without having to search too hard.

That’s what I Couldn’t Sleep is. A low-fi amalgamation of indie punk, creating a joyful burst of entertainment that caters to everybody’s likes in one way or another. Like some of those random Netflix films, I Couldn’t Sleep may not leave you in awe and running to tell your friends to check it out; but that’s not saying I wouldn’t watch it again if the movie came up on TV either.

Bursting out of the gate with Losing Streak, The New Lows deliver a highly energetic one-two punch of low-fi, mid-nineties Floridian punk. It’s No Idea Records meet Lookout Records, with raspy vocals ala Knucklehead and a certain Snuff-like quality. They pump up the pop aspect on ferpoahknicht, delivering an undeniably catchy tune before slowing it all down for a soothing, duelling vocal sing-along with Ghost – which should make High Dive fans interested.

You have the airy, whistling-laced indie-pop ditty in Arbor that sounds like a somewhat less materialized John K Samson tune while Abyeance has almost a Matt Skiba demo quality to it. There’s the necessary acoustic track with Frying Pan and the Frenzhal Rhomb-influenced Bite Me somehow follows.

There’s something for everyone, yet I Couldn’t Sleep somehow stays consistent. It never jumps too out to left field and still flows nicely, held together by the low-fi production and garage-rock overarching style.

And just like some of those Netflix films, I won’t run and tell my friends to check out The New Lows – but I’ll definitely replay it whenever I see the album sitting around and drag my friends to their show if they ever come through town. Sometimes, that’s good enough.