Broken Baby are based in LA and make music which is uncompromisingly rock – but with a post punk edge. The duo, made up from Amber Bollinger and veteran producer Alex Dezen (The Damnwells), their latest single, ‘Royal Pigs’ sounds like the love child of Taylor Swift and the B-52s…and that’s not a bad thing.
Broken Baby make angry, angsty music, but there’s still a real sense of fun in their style. It’s got the frantic guitars of the B-52s (and maybe the Bangles) but it’s combined with the “taking myself seriously but not that that seriously” vocal style of Swift. The angst is certainly there in their lyrics, such as
Why do I smile for the camera
Don’t they know I’m dead
Everything is just fine
which conjure up the world of the celeb, the pop star, the otherwise famous person – having to put on a brave face and a winning smile, even though you’re dying – or dead – inside. It’s political, it’s relevant, it’s now. Bollinger’s vocals are at once ferocious and also mellifluous, the intensity of the song is overwhelmingly catchy.
The intensity is not just limited to this song – their debut EP was written and recorded in a span of just over two weeks, while their 10 track album which followed was produced with similar speed. There’s a sense of urgency in everything they do, and the high energy carries over to the listener as well – we wouldn’t recommend you play Broken Baby’s music while driving.
It’d be remiss of me not to comment on the single art, which was custom designed by Hayden Menzies, of Canadian punk rock band METZ. It too has the same urgency as the song, and in the words of Bollinger,
“I think his art and our song were born out of the same fucked up ooze.”
‘Royal Pigs’ is available to stream and download here. Find Broken Baby on Bandcamp, Spotify, SoundCloud, their official website, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
