Perhaps more than in any other genres, punk and hardcore punk bands have a difficult balancing act to pull off: play things too safe to genre conventions and you often sound boring and uninspired, but let things get too wild and you risk sounding chaotic, messy, or just embarrassing. Not to mention, fans of these genres can be quite unreceptive to bands taking on board new ideas- just look at the polarising reception Title Fight received when they took a softer approach to the new-seminal Floral Green in 2012.

Thankfully, Baltimore’s Turnstile pull off this balancing act with flying colours. Their latest album, Glow On, features all the ingredients that make a good hardcore punk album worth listening to- invigorating performances, sticky hooks, catchy riffs. Then, they fold in just enough new twists to keep things interesting.
Much of what makes Glow On so refreshing lies in the production. Mike Elizondo, whose production and co-writing credits range from 50 Cent and Eminem to Mastodon and Fiona Apple, co-produced much of this album with the band itself. They pull off an impressive risk by mixing the band’s hardcore performances with the reverb-soaked, spacious mixing ethos of, say, The xx’s debut self-titled album. This allows the album to feature the same energy you’d hope for while giving it a polished finish and allowing each instrument its place in the spotlight.

But beyond the production, it’s the genre-agnostic stylistic choices that really turn heads on this album. Take ‘Blackout’, for instance, which begins as a fairly by-the-numbers (but nonetheless brilliant) punk song before giving way to a Bossa Nova groove section at the halfway mark. It’s the sort of risk that might sound embarrassing if it wasn’t executed so flawlessly. Much of the album takes similar surprising turns. Turnstile have never been scared to explore beyond their well-trodden terrain- their last album, 2018’s Time & Space, featured additional production from Diplo, while this album features cameos from Blood Orange and Julien Baker. Perhaps the only time things don’t quite hit the mark are on the final cut ‘Lonely Dezires’, which begins promisingly before fading out disappointingly into vapour. Chalk it up to the band trying to defy expectations, perhaps, but I cannot help but wish for the sort of climatic and explosive finish this album deserves.

Nonetheless, with Glow On, Turnstile have achieved the sort of scene-defying album the aforementioned Title Fight record became. This is the sort of album that will be referenced in production studios for years to come; only I can’t see any of the doubtless spawns of imitators pulling off an album this effortless or close to perfection.