Released officially on Nov. 17, Scene Point Blank is happy to host Music That Humans Can Play from Autogramm as our featured stream for the month of December.
The quartet is based in multiple cities with a member/former member list that includes Black Mountain, Destroyer, Night Court, Spitfires, Black Halos, Catheters, Lightning Dust, Bread & Butter, Spun Out, and many more. But when you get a list that size your eyes glaze over and, frankly, it highlights the point that it's not about those bands at all. It's about Autogramm, which we'll describe as protopunk meets power-pop with a healthy dose of synth and Bowie sneaking its way into the mix. It's accessible, it's concise, yet it's never too predictable.
Music That Humans Can Play sees the group adding new member Lars Von Seattle, alongside Jiffy Marx, CC Voltage, and The Silo. Like almost all recent projects, it's something of a self-exploration as the world experienced a pandemic, reshifting our priorities and focus both personally and artistically. Sonically, it has manages to capture the patient worldview required for a lengthy northern climate winter alongside the bright and fleeting but essential sunny summer barbecues.
Jiffy Marx gives us a replay of the album's inspiration:
The new album, Music That Humans Can Play, was written while Autogramm ultimately reconsidered their future as a band in the time of the global pandemic. Tours were thwarted a second and third time, and being separated between Vancouver and Chicago left the band feeling deflated and on the brink of disbanding indefinitely. It wasn’t until Jiffy Marx decided he no longer wanted to hold down the multiple roles of singer, keyboardist, and guitarist that they found the spark which reignited their engines. Enter Lars Von Seattle, legendary guitarist of Sub Pop’s late '90s/early '00s teenage heartthrobs, The Catheters. Lars rekindled his long-standing friendship with the members of Autogramm during a 2018 co-headlining tour with his other band, Seattle’s Bread & Butter. The idea to bring Lars on board as their dedicated guitarist meant adding another city to the band’s long distance relationship, but it defines the sound of their new album. Keyboardist/Singer Jiffy Marx reflected on the situation at the time by saying, “It seemed like right up to the day we started recording this album it might never happen, but not even being divided by an international border (during a global pandemic!) could get in our way, and I think we can all say we are glad it didn’t. Like our song says, we’re all Plastic Punx. Not hardcore punks, anarcho punks, gutter punks, or squeegee punks, but Plastic Punx. The kinda punks that don’t give a fuck, especially about how much money we’re getting at the show – as long as the venue isn’t too far from the hotel, and the hotel is close to the skatepark and/or the beach.
Music That Humans Can Play is out now on Stomp Records and Beluga Records (EU). Buy it here.
Catch the band soon in a city near you.
Learn more about the record in this short video.
Upcoming Live Dates:
December 14 VANCOUVER BC - RED GATE
December 15 SEATTLE - BELLTOWN YACHT CLUB
December 16 PORTLAND - HIGH WATER MARK
March SAT 16 NL - HAARLEM - SCHLACHTHUIS
March 17 BELGIUM / HOLLAND - TBA
March 18 BE - BRUXELLES - LE CHAFF
March 19 FR - PARIS – LÌNTERNATIONAL
March 20 DE - KOBLENZ - HAUS METTERNICH
March 21 - GERMANY TBA
March 22 DE - BOCHUM – WAGENI
March 23 DE - FRANKFURT – TBA
March 24 DE - BAYREUTH – SCHOKOFABRIK
March 25 DE - LEIPZIG – NBL
March 26 DE - DRESDEN - TBA
March 27 DE - BERLIN – SCHOKOLADEN
March 28 DE - HAMBURG – MS HEDI
March 29 HOLLAND - TBA
