Drake and Future’s What A Time To Be Alive was a celebration of how good their lives are, but now indie rock legends Superchunk have announced a new album with the same name, and they’re taking a more sarcastic approach to the phrase, delivering the creed more tongue-in-cheek and with more disdain towards the current state of affairs.
Superchunk’s What A Time To Be Alive, their eleventh album and first since 2013’s I Hate Music, comes out on February 16th, via Merge Records. Take a look at the floral-cranial album art:
In an interview with The AV Club, the band’s Mac McCaughan says the song is about both now and the consequences of what’s happening at the moment:
“I just think it’s terrorizing the average citizen every day, just mentally. Yes it’s about the present, but what I think about a lot, having kids, is how long is it going to take the country to dig out of this? Will my kids be fully grown adults and will we still be in this kind of shit, with all the stuff that Jeff Sessions is doing, Betsy DeVos is doing, Ryan Zinke is doing, Scott Pruitt is doing? These people are actually doing the real damage, and who knows how long it’s going to take to reverse all the harm they’re doing?”
McCaughan also says that the album as a whole shares similar themes:
“The album is about a lot of things of course but mainly dealing with anxiety and worse in the face of incipient authoritarianism. [It’s a record] about a pretty dire and depressing situation but hopefully not a record that is dire and depressing to listen to.”
Listen to the title track above, and check out the What A Time To Be Alive tracklist and Superchunk’s upcoming tour dates below.
1. “What a Time to Be Alive”
2. “Lost My Brain”
3. “Break the Glass”
4. “Bad Choices”
5. “Dead Photographers”
6. “Erasure”
7. “I Got Cut”
8. “Reagan Youth”
9. “Cloud of Hate”
10. “All for You”
11. “Black Thread”
2/15/2018 – Baltimore, MD @ Ottobar
2/17/2018 – Richmond, VA @ The Broadberry
2/21/2018 – San Diego, CA @ The Casbah
2/22/2018 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Moroccan Lounge
2/23/2018 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Teragram Ballroom
2/24/2018 – San Francisco, CA @ Great American Music Hall @ Noise Pop Festival
2/26/2018 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
2/27/2018 – Seattle, WA @ Neumos
2/28/2018 – Vancouver, BC @ Rickshaw Theatre
4/3/2018 – Washington, DC @ Black Cat
4/4/2018 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer
4/6/2018 – Cambridge, MA @ The Sinclair
4/7/2018 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
4/8/2018 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
4/26/2018 – Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West
4/27/2018 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle
4/28/2018 – Asheville, NC @ The Grey Eagle
