With their tongue-in-cheek songs and witty, self-deprecating lyrics, it would be easy to peg King of Summer as a group of four friends coming together to write music for kicks—and to some extent that’s true. But Tim Sterritt and company are also serious about their rock. Witness the the title of the group’s upcoming EP, Rock N Rollers From Hell, or the record’s cover art, which playfully recreates Queen’s 1974 sophomore offering, Queen II. While some might take these creative decisions as poking some good-natured fun at the sometimes bloated institution of rock, Sterritt insists their efforts are sincere. “Rock and roll is dope,” he tells me. “Respect to rock and roll.”
Similar things can be said about the EP’s lead single “Angel,” which we’re excited to premiere today. The track opens as a quietly tense tune that eventually unfurls into a driving melodic anthem in the vein of Weezer or the Menzingers at their most poppy and direct. It’s a boisterous, infectious cut full of big guitars and even bigger hooks that should sound mighty fine blasting out of your car this summer.
As for the lyrics, they’re a mix of dark humor and amusing revelations that initially led me to think the song might be mocking the longstanding tropes that have helped prop up the sex, drugs, and rock’n’roll ideal. (“I can snort a line of blow / While I’m drunk at the hospital / Contemplate losing my life / But that would suck so I think I won’t try,” Sterritt sings on the opening verse.) But according to the guitarist and vocalist, the song has far more personal origins. “I wrote this song at a time when I couldn’t stop thinking about death,” Sterritt reveals. “I moved to Decatur last August and I started spending a lot of my nights at shows and bars and being surrounded by drinking and drugs and just sort of wrote about what I saw friends of mine doing and how it made me feel.”
Ultimately, “Angel” reveals a heavier, more aggressive side to King of Summer without sacrificing the melodic overtones the group displayed on their debut EP, Getting Stabbed With an Ice Cream Cone. It’s a good look for the band, one that feels considerably organic and sincere given their shared musical tastes. “I love pop shit but a lot of our common interest bands are on the heavier side,” Sterritt says. “Fu Manchu, Queens of the Stone Age, Melvins. Not to say these songs sound anything like those bands, but we definitely tried to take our sound in a less poppy direction I think.”
Rock N Rollers From Hell drops June 17 on Bandcamp and most major streaming services. Physical copies of the EP will be available on cassette via Star Rats Records.
More Info
Bandcamp: kingofsummeratl.bandcamp.com
Facebook: @kingofsummeratl
Twitter: @kingofsummeratl