THIS MESS IS A PLACE | MUSIC CASSETTE

This Mess is a Place, Tacocat's fourth full-length and first on Sub Pop, finds the band waking up the morning after the 216 election and figuring out how to respond to a new reality where evil isn't hiding under the surface at all-it's front and center, with new tragedies and civil rights assaults filling up the scroll of the newsfeed every day. "What a time to be barely alive," laments "Crystal Ball," a gem that examines the more intimate side of responding emotionally to the news cycle. How do you keep fighting when all you want to do is stay in bed all day? "Stupid computer stupor / Oh my kingdom for some better ads," Nokes sings, throwing in some classic Tacocat snark, "Truth spread so thin / It stops existing." Despite current realities being depressing enough to make anyone want to crawl under the covers and sleep for a thousand years, Tacocat are doing what they've always done so well: mingling brightness, energy, and hope with political critique. This Mess is a Place is charged with a hopefulness that stands in stark contrast to music that celebrates apathy, despair, and numbness. Tacocat feels it all and cares, a lot, whether they're singing odes to the magical connections we feel with our pets (Little Friend), imagining what a better earth might look like (New World), or trying to find humor in a wholly unfunny world (The Joke of Life). It's a delightfully cathartic moment and the cornerstone of the record when they exclaim, in Grains of Salt: "Don't forget to remember who the fnck you are!" Producer Erik Blood (who also produced Lost Time) brings the band into their full pop potential but still preserves what makes Tacocat so special: they're four friends who met as young punks and have grown together into a truly collaborative band. Says Nokes: "We can examine some hard stuff, make fun of some evil stuff, feel some soft feelings, feel some rage feelings, feel some bitter-ass feelings, sift through memories, feel wavy-existential, and still go get a banana daiquiri at the end."