New Orleans no-wave punks Special Interest today share a new stand–alone single ‘Disco 1.5’. The track reflects the way “Disco” was meant to be heard, or rather, the way Special Interest have been playing it live for the past 4 or 5 years. File under Classic Interest. A perfectly formed punk song in one and a half minutes.
Special Interest’s recent album Endure, featuring the singles ‘Foul’, ‘Midnight Legend (feat. Mykki Blanco)’ and ‘(Herman’s) House’ landed in many notable Album of The Year lists last year including The Quietus Albums Of The Year, The Guardian 50 Best Albums of The Year, #4 on Pitchfork’s 50 Best Albums of the Year, Ele-King (Japan) #4 Album Of The Year and Mary Anne Hobbs #1 Album of the Year on BBC 6 Music.
Brought together by New Orleans’ inventive DIY scene, Special Interest finds a new way of defining the “rock band,” a true collective unit rather than the dictated vision of a single member. Their sound is ever-fluid and continues to evolve — Special Interest actually began as the duo of Alli Logout and Maria Elena with guitar, drum machine, and a power drill, before Nathan Cassiani and Ruth Mascelli filled out its current line-up.
Everything the group writes springs from the same source — a hard-hitting drum machine beat — but the possibilities are endless and the outcome always unpredictable. Even as their music transcends borders and adapts into new styles and forms, Special Interest is rooted in a sense of time and place, truly capturing what it feels like to exist in this moment.
Praise for Special Interest
“A dance-punk masterclass” –Rolling Stone
“A crescendo of gnashing guitar noise and thumping, clattering drum-machine beats…Righteous” -New York Times
“Radical politics, hardcore punk, glam rock and industrial techno smash together with joyous abandon on the latest album from New Orleans band Special Interest to create something new and life-affirming; few more visceral records have been released this year.” – Loud & Quiet
“After six years on the DIY circuit, 2022 saw the New Orleans punk outfit head towards the mainstream. …’Endure’ was notably more pop-aligned, with buoyant keys and groovy riffs wrestling against lead singer Alli Logout’s grizzled vocals and a chugging drum machine. It was a change that felt like a liberating step forward, learning to embrace the more playful side of punk, rather than a sellout move.” – The Guardian
“their most inventive, playful and accomplished music to date. Commanding its expanded palette with sincerity and ambition, it serves the group’s political and personal arguments with a newfound incisiveness. Its real masterstroke, however, is that it seems to be in constant dialogue with itself, expanding upon, revising, and comparing its ideas in the pursuit of what the perfect Special Interest album might be like. The result is their best album so far.” – The Quietus
“Danceable punk music that borrow from the angular, jittery rhythms of 80s bands, with frenzied songs that carry a highly political bent” -NPR Music
“If anyone can make an anti-capitalism call and response sound legitimately dangerous in 2022, it’s Special Interest” -FADER
