Words by Jason Lee
“Yesterday’s Papes (That’s Me!)” is the debut single by brand new-to-the-world baby band (only in terms of record releases tho’) Alphabet City but this baby’s come out of the womb and into this world not bloodied and covered in amniotic fluid but shockingly clean and sharply dressed even with a cigarette butt dangling from its digits as the infant confidently struts across the delivery room floor singing what sounds like it’s destined to be the first track on its upcoming Greatest Hits anthology over a hued from the bedrock of rare earth opening riff that’s downright primeval…
…a riff you can’t believe you’ve never heard before especially in your formative years listening to Q-102 Rhode Island’s Best Rock radio growing up cuz it’s got a riff like you’d expect an AI music generator to make up if you said “Hey Siri, get AI to create the guitar-only intro to a song song played by a band that’s equal parts AC/DC, Bad Company, and Creem (and Thin Lizzy too) like a circa 1974 supergroup with more than a hint of Dave Davies’ knack for making two-note riffs sound utterly compelling tho’ it soon gets more complex and holy shiz that guitar tone…
…but don’t get it twisted cuz Alphabet City ain’t no, well, yesterday’s papers, seeing as before us we have a multi-ethnic, mixed-gender band who know how to rawk in a way that Brooklyn badly needs to be rawked with the band’s single-monikered vocalist/guitarist Iyare getting inside your head with in a voice dripping with an insouciant savoir-faire that gives off Marc Bolan meets Phil Lynott with phrase endings routinely punctuated with a postmillennial whoop and we predict yr gonna be playin’ this song on repeat on your headphone the rest of this spring and into summer as you struct down Broadway with the sun beaming down on the sidewalks’ hot asphalt…
…but not the one in Manhattan, obviously, the one in Brooklyn like you’re Tony Manero with a can of paint in one hand and two folded up slices of pizza in the other beamed forward in time to 2024, a thoroughfare marking the border between the neighborhoods of Bushwick and Bed-Stuy under the shadow of the rattling elevated train cars above and the motorcars navigating the potholes below on the notoriously lawless speedway (pick a lane, any lane!) meanwhile you’re sashaying in time to the heavy head-nodding groove laid down by ABC’s riddim section comprised of Max (drums) and Alyssa (bass) having emerged from the womb with a band-introducing presser at the ready written with the pizzaz of a young, um, Tony Manero…
…Once upon a time, amongst the bric-a-brac of post-hipsterdom and the vinyl revival emerged garage rockers Alphabet City. Though their sound is hard to pinpoint, the band believe it can be distilled to one phrase: the sweet and sour. Their songs reflect every echelon of their record collection: the anarchic energy of The Who, minimalist moxie of the White Stripes, art school cool of Sonic Youth, and the playful “devil-may-care” attitude of the Replacements. With ABC, anything is up for grabs. Acid-tongued high priest Iyare channels all of this into his anthems for the age of disinformation generation, buoyed by “jack of all trades” handyman Max Had on drums and artist-in resident 4 string zinger Alyssa Tumale on bass. Someday the band plans to conquer the world, but in the meantime they’ll settle for charming the hearts of the tastemakers of the Brooklyn scene….
…which hey could they be talking about us (?!?) but of course we wouldn’t be so immodest to think so but ya never know anyway the song’s all about being treated like you’re “yesterday’s papers” but not letting it get to you which is a slang term so hip it hasn’t made it onto Urban Dictionary yet (we checked!) but which we’d define as “used up and thrown out” or more to the point “being deemed disposable” like news that’s a day old or more cuz believe it or not back in Ye Olden Days newspapers were printed by the millions and thrown out by the millions too…
…and if you’d told someone in 1974 that you read the New York Times on your phone they’d likely slowly back away and call the butterfly net paramedics so no wonder the cover of this single is laid out like a newspaper or more like a church newsletter really typewritten on cheap yellowed paper whose cover story happens to be the reprinted lyrics of “Yesterday’s Papers” in which the lady in question whose “home is where she please (jeez)” who threw out our song’s narrator like yesterday’s papers is addressed directly “Well, Lady. (yelp) You’ve got me hung to you. You tamed me (pronounced more like “yuuuh-ta-yay-yah-yah-ed-meh) (yelp) and ran me like a zoo” but hey ABC should take the descriptive lead here when it comes to the song’s inspiration…
…“Yesterday’s Papers” originates back to February 2020 BC (“before covid”), inspired by an evening ruminating on a potential relationship that seemingly reached a dead end. Reflecting on the direness of the situation, I remember concluding to myself – “Yesterday’s Papers…that’s me.” Corny? Certainly. A bit melodramatic? Absolutely! But it sure made for a good hook and upon returning back to my dorm, I got to work. Four years later, the girl’s long gone, but the song remains…
…and now there’s a young man with a good attitude we say cuz when you’re deemed yesterday’s paper you make yesterday’s paper lemonade and spike it with a song-closing guitar solo that sounds like a slug of whiskey in musical form and how did the band come up with its throbbingly raw sound you may be asking which we’ll just assume you are cuz here’s what Iyare has to say about it…
…At the time of the song’s conception, the band was a two-piece (guitar and drums) desperate for more material that fit within those limitations and the primitive simplicity of the song was a byproduct of this. Alyssa’s arrival on bass allowed us to give the song a groove, transforming it into the kind of thing you can bop your head to. I think that combination of primal-ness and catchiness with the sing-song nature of the chorus has made it one of our most beloved numbers amongst our live show…
…so there you have it and now it all makes sense and we wish the band well on their impending journey up the rocky summit of rock and we hope that if and when things get hard for a minute they’ll heed their own words about how “if you back down, outta here, you’re bound to kowtow to everything you fear (ya hear?)” and this is a band that excels in parentheticals we’re starting to notice and who knows how many other things besides as the confidently strutting band themselves seems to know an indicated by the throwaway throwback three-part vocal harmony major-triad-pyramid they playfully throw in at song’s end and finally here’s what they have to say about it…
“Yesterday’s Papers” is a perfect illustration of the band’s sound: a sheer wall of melodic cacophony that’s barely holding it together under its booming drums, thundering bass, and feedback-laden guitar. It’s like 60’s bubblegum pop music mixed with battery acid. It’s, well, us! It’s an honor and privilege to share one’s art with others, and we’re certainly curious to see what friends and fans alike make of it. More to come in the near future.
Alphabet City plays an as yet unannounced Deli showcase (you heard it here first!) on Friday, June 7th at Bar Freda