Album Review: Jeff Rosenstock – “We Cool?”

Like any subculture, punk rock relies on the spark of youth to propel it forward. Yet there comes a time in every young punk’s life when he or she must face an enemy more terrifying than the threat of conformity could ever be: getting old. Perhaps no one knows this better than Jeff Rosenstock, former leader of the recently disbanded DIY collective Bomb the Music Industry! and author of countless punk rock anthems that tackle the many difficulties of becoming an adult.

Rosenstock gave his followers little time to mourn the end of his longest-operating project, quickly releasing two short-but-sweet records with Fake Problems frontman Chris Farren as the power pop duo Antarctigo Vespucci, as well as a handful of quality singles and covers over the course of the past two years. Still, it’s been since 2012’s self-depracatingly-titled I Look Like Shit that fans were treated to an LP’s worth of cohesive Rosenstock material. While that record was set almost entirely in a domestic fortress of solitude lined with overflowing trash bags and dirty dishes, his latest solo outing finds our punk messiah resurrected from the dead and ready to breathe new life into his still-fledgling solo career.<

As its title implies, We Cool? is a record about the importance of maintaining personal relationships — friendships and connections that used to mean the world to you but now threaten to decay and disappear in the face of growing up, heading down separate paths, and maybe even making a few mistakes along the way. While such commonly explored material always runs the risk of cliché, Rosenstock’s presence as one of the most relatable and welcoming figures in the punk community helps turn We Cool? into a stunning success and one of his finest releases yet.

What remains most satisfying about Rosenstock’s music is the singer’s continuing development as both a songwriter and a performer. These songs burn bright with a level of urgency never before heard in Rosenstock’s already explosive catalogue. “You, in Weird Cities” contains not one but two of the finest choruses in Rosenstock’s career, both of which the singer delivers as if his life depends on it, as if the failure to address the growing distance between his friends could doom him to a lifetime of “always getting high when no one is around.” Meanwhile, the rousing and cathartic “Beers Again Alone” functions as the latest installment in a series of songs that includes such Bomb the Music Industry! classics as “Wednesday Night Drinkball” and “Stand There Until You’re Sober”, as Rosenstock continues to find creative new ways to express alcohol-fueled feelings of isolation, exclusion and depression.

Similarly high-stakes highlights such as “I’m Serious, I’m Sorry” and “Polar Bear or Africa” help make We Cool? as consistent an album as any of Rosenstock’s previous full-lengths, but the LP’s finest moment arrives in “Nausea”, the record’s jaw dropping centerpiece. While fans may be familiar with a previously-issued acoustic demo, the finished version of the song must be heard to be believed, as sprightly piano and brass arrangements are undercut by ugly, embarrassing lyrics about streaming porn in between bong hits and hiding from the people who care about you even when you know you’re just letting the darkness win. The song climaxes to a backdrop of beautiful Beach Boys harmonies and represents what just might be Rosenstock’s artistic peak: all of the themes and imagery he’s ever explored tightly written into one definitive burst of melodic excellence.

If there’s one lesson to be learned from We Cool?, it’s that you can’t hide from your problems. When Rosenstock compels another estranged friend to “crush that gloom!” he may as well be singing to you and me. Rosenstock has devoted enough of his career to writing and singing about feeling lonely and depressed to know that the answers to his problems aren’t at the bottom of a bottle or under his bedsheets; what really makes our lives special are the people in them, as well as the future that Rosenstock spends so much of this new record chasing, an adulthood that’s made worth it simply by the prospect of getting old with the people we love. Who knew that growing up could be so punk?