In Defense of the Genre is a column on BrooklynVegan about punk, pop punk, emo, hardcore, post-hardcore, ska-punk, and more, including and often especially the bands and albums and subgenres that weren’t always taken so seriously.
2024 is a wrap, and we looked back on the year with our list of the 50 best punk albums of 2024 (“punk” meaning all the subgenres I usually cover in this column), plus subgenre-specific lists of our favorite screamo and hardcore. And now for one more list: the 5 best songs from underneath the punk umbrella from December through very early January (1/5 or earlier).
See also from December: reviews of the Red Sun/Bonus split and the No Cure concept EP.
Find new and exclusive punk vinyl in the BV shop, and if you haven’t done so already, you can also pick up our exclusive Alexisonfire box set, reissues & magazine and our Glassjaw box set & book.
Saetia – “Tendrils”
I never got the chance to see Saetia the way they were meant to be seen (on a floor at a house show in the late ’90s), but when I saw them on a big stage opening for The Blood Brothers last month, I was taken aback by just how much they captured the chaos and intensity of the kind of Northeast basement-show screamo that they helped invent in the first place. So, needless to say, it was an extremely pleasant surprise when, just three weeks later, I found out they released their first new song since the ’90s. And it was an even more pleasant surprise when I clicked play and heard that the song captures everything that Saetia captured on stage in December. Recorded with new guitarist Tom Schlatter, who’s been in about 100 Saetia-inspired screamo bands, “Tendrils” has one thing Saetia never had (good recording quality) and otherwise it pretty much sounds exactly like they did back in the day. Coming at a time in which Saetia’s influence is more widespread than ever and their old music still sounds timeless, “Tendrils” leaves as big an impact as it would have at any point in the last quarter-century.
The song is the title track of a new 3-song EP which is up for pre-order on vinyl now.
Thursday – “Taking Inventory of a Frozen Lake” / “White Bikes”
I generally try to only include one song per album cycle in this monthly column, and Thursday appeared in my April 2024 list with “Application For Release From the Dream,” but exceptions can and will be made when we’re talking about the first new music in 13 years from one of the most enduring bands of the 2000s post-hardcore boom. (Also I have no idea if or when a full new album is coming, but the strength of their new singles has me really hoping we do get one soon.) There was so much riding on “Application,” being the band’s first new song in such a long time, and it cleared every bar, sounding like the past, present, and future of Thursday all at once. And after proving they’ve very much still got something to say, they dropped “Taking Inventory of a Frozen Lake” and “White Bikes,” two more songs that instantly stand tall within the Thursday canon. These two sound a little more explicitly like the Full Collapse / War All the Time era than “Application,” and Thursday know exactly how to channel that era of their career in a way that sounds completely fresh and forward-thinking ~25 years later. These songs serve as reminders that Thursday was and still is a special band that transcends whatever trend or cultural moment they were once grouped with. It sounds like the Thursday you know and love, and it hits as hard in 2025 as Full Collapse did in 2001.
Fleshwater – “Standalone”
Fleshwater have been rising to the top of the world of shoegaze/grunge/post-hardcore hybrids, and this year they’ll be on an arena tour opening for one of the most influential bands on that world, Deftones. Ahead of that tour, they’ve dropped a 68-second long song that finds them leaning into their heavy post-hardcore side, and it instantly feels like one of their best songs yet. I just wish it didn’t end so soon.
Rifle – “Soldier Doll”
UK punks Rifle have been making a lot of noise lately, and in December, they dropped a rippin’ new three-song EP called Pack Mentality for the Year0001 label (Viagra Boys, Yung Lean, Bladee), produced by Jonah Falco of Fucked Up (whose new album Someday features Rifle vocalist Max Williams). Not totally unlike their UK neighbors The Chisel (who also work with Jonah), Rifle toe the line between classic street punk and modern hardcore, and Pack Mentality highlight “Soldier Doll” is a perfect example of that. It’s the kind of good old fashioned, no-nonsense punk that never goes out of style, and Rifle do it very, very well.
Zeta – “Steps” (ft. Anthony Green)
Okay, one more exception to my “one song per album cycle” rule and this time it’s because “Steps” is a uniquely remarkable collaboration that feels as much like a Zeta song as it does an Anthony Green song. The Venezuelan-born, Florida-based Zeta craft an experimental, reggae-and-prog-infused post-hardcore backdrop that shares some DNA with the Anthony Green-fronted supergroup The Sound of Animals Fighting (whose lineup also includes multiple members of RX Bandits, who Zeta will tour with this year), and Anthony’s voice blends seamlessly with Zeta’s own vocals. He ends up sounding less like a guest and more like an honorary member of the band.
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Catch up on previous months’ lists for even more:
For even more new songs, listen below or subscribe to our playlist of punk/emo/hardcore/etc songs of 2024.
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Browse our selection of hand-picked punk vinyl.
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Read past and future editions of ‘In Defense of the Genre’ here.
