Do You Believe In Love? my AOTY
Post-Punk group Thus Love released their sophomore album 'All Pleasure' & it's all that's been on my mind.... An album reaction, if you will.
2024 has been many things. A year of loss, clarity, exploration … really new beginnings.
Despite not being as active here as I would have liked, I still consider music my primary passion and ultimate professional pursuit.
There have been numerous albums that have captured my attention this year. The music scene feels as broad and boundless as ever, and that’s nothing short of thrilling.
However, as 2024 comes to a close, and as I write what very well may be thee “end-of-the-year” post, I can’t help but feel as though music took on a new meaning for me this year. It became less of an entity and more of a place. A place I sought solace in many times. Because, if you’re ever feeling lonely, “just go to the record store and visit your friends”. Good music has the power to cultivate a place within ourselves so we feel less alone. And that’s what my ‘Album of the Year’ did for me.
Thus Love performing “Lost in Translation” live at Elsewhere in November.
Thus Love’s sophomore record All Pleasure is an album that celebrates queer love, friendship, personal reckonings, religion, a commentary on living in late-stage-capitalism America, and existing in spite of it all.
Thus Love is making Punk Political, Personal, and Counterculture again.
Music is more than the message, sure. But, at least Thus Love has a message. And, as someone once said, the personal is inherently political. A lot of modern Rock music seems to lack in personal story — which, of course, is sometimes made up for by sounding great. But, man, it is nice to experience music that not only offers a compelling sound, but also a deeper resonance.
The first time I saw Thus Love was at Mercury Lounge in 2022 when they opened for UK indie-rock band Sports Team. The band, then a trio, had just released their debut album Memorial. Their performance blew me away, and stuck out to me perhaps even more so than the headlining act, who I’d come to see. I immediately researched the band thereafter and have been a fan ever since.
Now let’s talk the ten-track (a perfect length for an album, if you ask me) rundown. Ranked in order of personal preference:
“Lost in Translation” — easily stood out to me as my favorite track. It boasts a darker, moodier sound, complete with lingering & echoey guitar chords and Mars’ vocals varying from deviously hypnotic to possessed and passionate.
The simple repetition of the drum and bass that build to a dizzying guitar solo, makes you feel as though you’re also lost in translation. Entering a universe of dizzying auditory vertigo. There are elements of this track that feel very Fontaines DC… Bowie… Glam-Punk, perhaps.
“On the Floor” — one of the three singles released leading up to All Pleasure. The noisy — almost wiry — guitar sound mocks the back and forth internal monologue of the song. “On the Floor” mirrors a mind run wild — an internal dialogue voiced. Trying to make peace with where we’ve been, where we are, who we’ve been, and who we are.
“Take time to figure out / All these things to unlearn about” is likened to the experience of withdrawals. Unlearning is an act of withdrawal. Whether you’re unlearning a negative habit, feeling, behavior, belief — anything can be unlearned. However, it is impossible to unlearn a part of yourself without experiencing a withdrawal for the person you were.
When “Birthday Song” dropped as the first single, I knew I would adore this record. The first few bass lines followed by Mars seductively asking “Do You Believe in Love?” was only what I can describe as auditory salivation. The delivery of said question is nothing short of honest, earnest sex-appeal.
This track takes more of a glam-punk-rock approach sonically. With deep vocals reminiscent of Alex Turner meets (more) Bowie meets Bolan.
“All Pleasure” — The titular track captured my attention with the addictive electric guitar. The rise and fall of the chords as they repeat between chorus’ is alluring and hypnotic, creating an experience centered on all auditory pleasure.
Here again, the lyrics point to looking inward. Healing ones’ self and the complex, non-linear, process that comes with. Trying to answer all the questions that ultimately will lead to finding “All Pleasure”.
“Get Stable” — Punchy, direct, and slightly unhinged. Exactly the kind of track I can resonate with. The bass & guitar mirrors the back and forth of Mars’ dictations. The sound itself is “unstable”. The lyrics, an attempt to find stability in-spite of it.
On a personal level, I resonate to this track deeply… at odds with oneself trying to find a stable ground, being forced to reckon with all that you’ve avoided facing in order to do so. Hence, “it’s not what I’m afraid of / because I can’t feel a thing”.
“House on a Hill” — provides a near sardonic commentary regarding our late-stage-capitalism driven society and the mirage of the “american dream”. It touches on the simple, yet tragic, lack of time for oneself, including literal self-pleasure, citing this way of life leaves “no room for masturbation”.
Sonically, the track builds to an almost cacophonous, symphonic breaking point, coupled with Mars’ yelling the words “House on Hill” exhaustively. The song perhaps mirrors the exhaustion this generation feels, living under late-stage capitalism, a fraught government, all culminates to a feeling of stagnation with our ability enact change, not only globally, but also in our own lives.
And, worst of all, this has affected our allotting room for the simple pleasures such as masturbation.
“Bread for Blood” — has almost a funk element to it. This track stands out to me as one of the two “outliers” on the album. If you happen to be deaf, and are relying solely on my sound descriptors, imagine if Depeche Mode made a soul/funk track, stringing in a 70s-disco-Saturday-night-fever swagger.
“Bread for Blood” feels like an expression of live-band showmanship with a trumpet/brass sound lingering somewhere in the upper arches at the end of the track.
“Losing A Friend” — This album is very much filial love focused. In the final track, Thus Love gives the power of friendship its flowers.
It’s hard to articulate the pain that comes with losing a friend. Whether that’s through growing apart, or through death. What stuck out to me most with this track is the overall up-beat tempo the song maintains. Rather than solely lamenting the loss of a friend, the song presents a celebration of the experience that being that friend represented and the mark that relationship left.
“Face to Face” — What stuck out to me most was the band’s inclusion of “Face to Face”. It’s median placement in the album feels nothing short of intentional. Thus Love members Echo Mars & Lu Racine come from classically trained musical backgrounds. “Face to Face”, which might appear almost out of place for a post-punk, noise-rock group, pays homage to this heritage featuring a more stripped track with vocals and piano.
“Face to Face” might be Thus Love reckoning with their past and present version of themselves not only musically, but also personally.
“Show Me Patience” — Glam rock meets psychedelia on this track. This track simultaneously burns out while fading away, and ultimately, compared to the others on the album, feels the most lacking in substance.
The sound and passion are there as much as any other track; however, the song comes off as a less of a song and more of a personal plea to be shown patient love. Which, we all deserve and are worthy of. The overall lyrical messaging lacks by comparison to the other tracks in which I feel the band truly outdid themselves in crafting.
Listening to this album feels as though I’ve flipped through Thus Love’s personal journal and read through all the entries. Yet, despite the intimacy of the album, Thus Love has succeeded in making a vulnerable record resonate on a personal level with their audience as well.
Ultimately, All Pleasure is nothing short of Art in its purest and most raw form.
This album feels like a metaphor for a transitional period. And, perhaps I say this because 2024, for me, feels as such. But I do believe, in a larger sense, this album signifies Thus Love’s transition into the band they have now become. Emerging onto the scene with a new-ness informed by all their past musical journeys.
Ultimately, All Pleasure is asking the audience: Do you believe in Love? Despite the way the government, the world, society, are making us live? Can you find love even in the darkest of places personally? Can you find love in loss? Can you still find a way to pleasure yourself despite the radicalization that the world around you is forcing you to hang on a string? It is telling us to remember. Remember the friendship that has existed and will continue to exist. That the Love around us; the painful and plentiful is all we need to propel us forward. Do believe in it. And all the ways it shows.
“Remember to breathe, it’s the worst it’ll ever be”. Truer words have never rang.