• News

• All

May 12, 2021 By Caleb Campbell

Indie rock band Spud Cannon began as a band of strangers back in 2016 at Vassar College. The quintet debuted in a whirlwind with 2017’s Next Time Read The Fine Print, quickly following with their 2018 record Squeeze and a stressful 2019 tour. That tour ended on a homecoming when, unable to secure a venue, the band closed the tour on the Vassar squash courts.

Inspired by the immediate energy they found there, the band returned for a series of secret recording sessions that would make up their forthcoming third record, Good Kids Make Bad Apples. The band already has shared “Juno” and “Supersonic” from the record and are now back with their latest single, “You Got It All (NOT)” premiering with Under the Radar.

“You Got It All (NOT)” is pure indie bliss, in the same vein as jangling indie pop hitmakers like Hippo Campus or Passion Pit. Infectious energy, sing-along melodies, and danceable rhythms all abound, carried along by the airy vocal performances and upbeat instrumentals. At the same time, the song has a biting lyrical tone alongside the bright melodies, with the band having some sarcastic fun at the expense of self-impressed male archetypes.

As lead singer Meg Matthews explains, “This song DROVE ME CRAZY!!! I spent hours singing along to the voice memo in my car to work out the melody, and even longer trying to figure out lyrics back in Summer ‘19… After trying night after night by myself, I had pages of loose lines, rhymes, and ideas, but it took a group effort with Lucy and Ari to actually solidify anything.”

Ari Bowe continues saying, “Since we collaborated on this song, I followed Meg’s lead when it came to the concept behind the lyrics. To me, it’s about these back-and-forth feelings for someone who is lovable yet stubborn and difficult to deal with. Kind of like an internal conflict between caring for this person while also grappling with their inability to be emotionally mature.

Guitarist Jackson Walker Lewis further explains, “Instrumentally, this was by far the one we spent the most time on…The song in total is just a hybridization of many influences—for the intro, I wanted to draw inspiration from “This Charming Man”/”Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” whereas the verse mimics the sequence from The Jam’s “A Town Called Malice”…While it felt like a wrestling match the whole way through it, I refused to give up on it because I fervently believed it to be the indie magnum opus of the album, almost a crystallization of all we had done previously.”

Check out the song and accompanying video (also filmed on the Vassar squash courts) below. Good Kids Make Bad Apples is out June 25th on Good Eye Records.