ALBUM REVIEW: NOBRO – Set Your Pussy Free (Dine Alone Records)
Canadian quartet NOBRO were a new name to me when this album dropped into my inbox, but they’re certainly one I’ll be looking out for in future.
They’re a modern punk band and this is their debut full-length, and it’s one of the freshest-sounding things I’ve heard this year.
The Montreal, Quebec, band says it’s “an explosive unapologetic sonic manifesto where we refuse to play by anyone else’s rules.”
That may sound a little conceited for a band on their first album, but Set Your Pussy Free has bucketloads of attitude, boundless energy, and some catchy as hell tunes.
Kathryn McCaughey (vocals/bass), Karolane Carbonneau (guitar), Lisandre Bourdages (keys & percussion) and Sarah Dion (drums) have spent time honing their sound since forming NOBRO in 2014.
After a string of singles and EPs, capped with 2020’s Sick Hustle and 2022’s Live Your Truth Shred Some Gnar, they’ve gained a few celebrity fans along the way, including 6 Music’s Iggy Pop.
Their debut long-player kicks off with sleaze-rock stomper Set That Pussy Free, which immediately grabs your attention with its message of female empowerment. And there’s plenty more where that came from.
Delete Delete Delete, with its punchy bassline, is a reaction to the digital age in which we live, as they insist: “I don’t want to be on the internet”, while A.I. Sexbots is about embracing your own sexuality, including “A.I. sexbots for the weirdos” if that’s what turns you on!
Standout track I Don’t Feel Like It is a defiant two-fingered salute to anyone who dares to tell the feisty foursome how they should behave or live their lives.
We can surely all identify as Kathryn sings: “I thought I’d be a better person by now/I thought I’d be a better version of myself/I know I could if I tried, well I do/Let’s face the truth, I don’t fucking feel like it!”
Where My Girls At is the story of how NOBRO got to where they are, from forming a rock ‘n’ roll band to “selling t-shirts in a garbage bag/20 bucks more for the one on my back.”
Having a good time is clearly part of the band’s grand plan, evident from tracks like lead single Let’s Do Drugs, Let’s Get Out Of Here and riotous closer Gimme More (Party Through The Pain).
Cash In On My Cachet and Who The Hell Am I? are more self-doubting, while Nobody Knows is NOBRO at their heaviest, spewing out Led Zep riffs with cymbals a-crashing as they insist: “I never wanna go home, I wanna party all night/Is there a place I can go, where nobody know our names?”
Set Your Pussy Free is a real headrush of an album, and you can’t fail to be impressed by its punky riffs, riot grrrl energy and infectious choruses. Let’s go NOBRO! 8.5/10
- Check out Set Your Pussy Free at NOBRO’s Bandcamp page HERE.
