Future Islands — “From a Hole in the Floor to a Fountain of Youth”
For longtime fans of Future Islands, listening to “From a Hole in the Floor to a Fountain of Youth” is like opening a time capsule. The new release from the Wham City alums is a thoughtfully-curated compilation of B-sides and rarities. It’s still the tight synth-pop package that has made Future Islands so recognizable over the last two decades, but the track list feels like something newly unearthed.
Many of vocalist Sam Herring’s lyrics mystify and enchant me. They perform little scenes in my mind. The title “From a Hole in the Floor to a Fountain of Youth” comes from the song “Pinnochio,” off the band’s 2009 release “Feathers and Hallways.” It evokes images of transformation for me — the idea of making something from nothing. Transformation is something Future Islands is good at. In their first three recordings, they transformed a modest collection of instruments and a portable studio setup into layers and layers of sound. On stage, Herring transforms from a clean-cut, khaki-sporting man on the street into an erratic, strikingly emotional force of nature. Keyboardist and sound engineer Gerrit Welmers and bassist William Cashion transform atmospheric beats and propulsive basslines into windows-down road trip ballads. “From a Hole in the Floor” is emblematic of that integral sound and ethos and serves as a map of the band’s evolution as well.
This new release repackages the rawer early recordings into high-fidelity studio recordings, which makes them easier to position alongside more recent releases like the shimmery earworm “Glimpse” and the more subdued “Sail.” But even those later tracks retain that same punk energy that first brought the band together. “Six Weeks,” a song that invokes lo-fi indie-folk of the midaughts, shows the band’s range, while “Cotton Flower” is reminiscent of much of their material on “On the Water.” The band’s B-sides have the same driving energy as their hits, and that makes for a really gratifying listening experience.
Every detail of “From a Hole in the Floor” is a nod to the fans and collaborators that have been with Future Islands since the beginning. The cover of the album was designed by Nolen Strals, who has a longstanding relationship with the band and once played in the now-defunct band Double Dagger. Though it appears to be a painting or a graphic illustration, the image is actually a photograph of a handmade sculpture. Each song on the album is represented by a rod whose colors are the artist’s interpretation of the dominant hues from the cover of the release the song originally appeared on. This cover art and the appearance of guest vocalists such as Jenn Wasner (Wye Oak, Flock of Dimes) and Katrina Ford (Celebration) are a testament to the members’ thoughtful and generative connection to the Baltimore arts scene of a certain era.
After more than 20 years of carving out their specific niche, Future Islands has no need to prove themselves. The subject matter of their music has always been the past, and this record follows that same blueprint. It’s absolutely a nostalgia trip, but it’s reflective rather than pining or revisionist. Baltimore’s arts scene has seen significant changes since the height of Future Islands’s success — in no small part because of the political turmoil of two Trump presidencies and a pandemic — but this compilation permanently preserves a very specific and seminal cultural moment in Baltimore’s DIY history.
“Baltimore’s arts scene has seen significant changes since the height of Future Islands’s success — in no small part because of the political turmoil of two Trump presidencies and a pandemic — but this compilation permanently preserves a very specific and seminal cultural moment in Baltimore’s DIY history.”
As I listened to the album, I imagined the band sifting through their discography and stringing together a narrative of the last 20 years that feels meaningful. I did the same. Like the members of Future Islands themselves, I moved back to the city as an adult because I felt like it was fertile ground for making weird, confrontational art. I remembered when I was but a wee college radio DJ at the University of Maryland in 2012. My co-host and I played “Tin Man” and sat in the booth grinning at each other like we were sharing a secret. Last week, I had that same feeling listening to “Tomorrow,” when Herring sings, “We’ve known each other for a long time / Though you had me from the first / I told you all of my secrets / I wish I had them back now.”
“From a Hole in the Floor to a Fountain of Youth” reveals some of Future Islands’s best kept secrets and, as a longtime fan, I now feel like a possessor of something quite intimate. I’m glad it can’t be taken back. (Rhea Ramakrishnan)
“From a Hole in the Floor to a Fountain of Youth” by Future Islands is available on Bandcamp and elsewhere.
The first time I saw Jordan Midder perform was at the Hampden Skatepark in 2024. His project at the time was jrdn and the switchblades — fuzzy power pop delivered with artpunk attitude. On “Versus,” Midder brings the same energy and aesthetics to a more introspective and reflective project.
“Born out of frustration—not with others, but with the weight of everyday existence, Versus lives in the essence of simply trying. Trying to create, to survive, to keep going,” reads the description on the project’s Bandcamp. The first tracks on the EP, “Dispatch” and “Landmine” call to mind “Blood Visions” era Jay Reatard. Like the late Memphis punk visionary, Midder records on a 4-track in his bedroom. Unlike Jay, his demeanor is mellow and amicable. And the subject material of his lyrics is far more constructive. While Reatard wrote songs about self-annihilation, Midder is writing songs about a tunnel of stagnation and how he’s trying to get to the other side.
The second half of the EP is more reminiscent of San Francisco power pop trio The Nerves. “In Loving Memory,” a song about wishing an estranged friend or romantic partner the best in their future endeavors, has that laidback California attitude. And the hook is genuinely infectious.
A few weeks after the release of “Versus,” I ran into Midder outside of the warehouse where both of our bands practice. He was looking for four leaf clovers in the grass next to the curb before loading out to play a show at Holy Frijoles. We rapped about playing shows with bands whose members are a decade younger than us. Midder has a growing collection of unreleased tracks he plans to share soon. How soon is unclear. Some of the songs on “Versus” have been waiting to see the light of day since 2024. “I’m slow to release things,” he admitted, “When I put out new music, I want it to be meaningful because it means a lot to me.”
The fact that I showed up for a show that started at 9 p.m. on a Tuesday should say something about my enthusiasm for this EP. Kickboxerr did not disappoint. In their live band, Midder plays guitar, James Beam is on drums, and Kyle Maize plays bass. It’s the same tight trio that made up jrdn and the switchblades, and the guys play some switchblades songs in their set too. The set is fun and danceable and, simultaneously, gives me an appreciation for the vulnerability of the recordings, which reveal Midder’s personal touches in every detail.
On the EP’s final track, “Wallride”, Midder sings, “and you say it’s over / dead we wallride out / If you keep your rails held high we both slip out / I wanna wallride out.” It’s ostensibly about a skateboard trick, but it takes all the frustration and inertia of the first six tracks and creates momentum with unflappable ease. My stint with skateboarding was short-lived and ended painfully, but “Versus” makes me feel like maybe I could give it another shot. (Rhea Ramakrishnan)
“Versus” by Kickboxerr is available on Bandcamp.
In their new EP, Grudge asks the city of Baltimore to “Think For Yourself.” They lead by example on the 5-track release that combines deft songwriting and instrumentation with airtight grooves. In each song, the band delivers a satisfying heavy punk sound and still leaves room for small, joyous surprises. This is for fans of the sudden falling sensation that happens just as you’re about to drift off to sleep.
The second song, “Priced to Sell,” is a two-for-one special. One second Rhea Ramakrishnan (a Beat contributor) is rolling her eyes and gagging at the lie being sold to us: “Priced to sell / It’s a cold, dark world / Gotta treat yourself / What are you waiting for / Money solves everything / You can buy anything.” In the very next, her vocals ring out clear as Baltimore glass: “This world is my property / No one can take it from me.” Ross Lockhart beats out an unyielding, uptempo drum section. All the while, the guitars of Dallon Anderson and Sebastian Davis strike a dissonant contrapuntal tone that is ominous and inquisitive as it bounces and builds between the two of them. Inokentiy Aksentiev’s bass flips the song end over end at the 2:22 mark, and if you weren’t moving before you’ve got an entire minute left to claim your space.
The singles, “Fixate” and “I Hope You Rot,” show incredible range. “Fixate” gives us a goths on the beach vibe as it melts into danceable surf rock before scaling back up to a dramatic finish. Ramakrishnan’s lyrics describe the pain of cyclical mental anguish. On “I Hope You Rot,” the band storms in on a tirade against nihilism, then pulls the reins back for a crowd favorite minimalist breakdown. As the titular track stops abruptly, GRUDGE leaves us with this: “Only you can break free from those chains.” (Didi Cook-Creek)
“Think For Yourself” is available on bandcamp. Cassette tapes are also available at thirdhouse.limitedrun.com.
Baltimore is in the middle of a punk and hardcore moment, and if there were anything like a record industry anymore, slick-suited A&R dudes would be creeping around town trying to sign the next Turnstile. Instead, Baltimore’s newer punk bands keep doing what they’ve always done around here — kicking ass in unique, weird, individual ways.
And it’s not like any of the bands playing now started after Turnstile got big or nothing. When I first started to listen to Pearl, it felt like I was remembering the contours of a dream whose content I could not place. Eventually, I realized that Sienna Cureton-Mahoney, Pearl’s singer, formerly fronted Wet Brain, one of the most interesting and fun bands of Baltimore’s rock (or whatever) scene a decade or so ago.
But while Cureton-Mahoney’s vocals and a generally punk sensibility link the two bands, Pearl’s bass-driven sound occupies its own space. “Sleep,” one of their new album’s longest songs at 2:38, feels like an epic. Right from the gate, Cureton-Mahoney’s words ride right on top of Jesse Hutchinson’s brutally bouncing bass at the forefront of the song, overwhelming Tommy Rouse’s guitar and Flynn DiGuardia’s drums, which break through like thunder between verses. Then about halfway through the song, there’s a breakdown, where we are first really able to hear the guitar as it scratches out a sort of surf trash riff which resolves into into another quick blast through the A part, ending in an intricate barrage from DiGuardia’s furiously pounding drums before the whole thing literally dissolves into about 30 seconds of a cheesy (in the best way) synth-sounding outro.
This is a punk band that can write a damn song and that thinks a lot about craft. And while they definitely fit in with the current wave of heavy bands, they are doing something different, something somehow almost as proggy as it is punk — but only secretly so. To tell the truth, if I weren’t writing about it, I may have surfed on the thrashing tempo and the fierce vocals and just rocked out, without quite realizing how written and arranged the songs feel. On “Discipline,” Cureton-Mahoney snarls “Discipline is killing me,” but this album contains a heavy dose of the deep artistic discipline that leads to freedom.
“Coward” begins with a woozy sample from the old video game Sinistar over faint drums which abruptly shift into a heavy riff. “You’ve always been a coward / under a false sense of pride/ But when they’re really coming for you / you’ll be the first to run and hide,” Cureton-Mahoney spits in a tight couplet just before a high guitar whine slips in under the bass. After a couple more verses, there’s a fierce drum-heavy doubletime (or more?) breakdown that sends the song into another place altogether.
The next number, another long one at nearly two and a half minutes, has a kind of throwback feel, like it’s a cross between Mötley Crüe’s “Live Wire” and Black Flag’s “Rise Above,” with some Bad Brains glossed over it all. “Treat you like my son / for acting like a clown / watching you go belly up / ‘bout to shut you down,” Cureton-Mahoney roars before rocking into an anthemic refrain of “if this were a competition / I’ve already won.”
Sounds about right to me.
(Baynard Woods)Love and Grief is Available on Bandcamp.