For a generation of a certain subset of pop-punk fans, the Lillingtons were both formative and important. Their themed albums were proof that the Ramones-core genre could be melodic, heart-wrenching, emotional, intricate, and transcendent. Lillingtons’ frontman Kody Templeman eventually became a (punk) household name as one of the dual vocalist-guitarists of Teenage Bottlerocket, but fans who had gotten in on the ground floor (more or less) back in the Death By Television days always secretly pined for some more Lillingtons offerings.
After first breaking up in 2001, Lillingtons fans got another blast of that sonic goodness with 2006’s The Too Late Show, but it’s been a very long winter without a new full-length album … until now. The Lillingtons got back together for an EP that came out in June, but now their first LP in 11 years, Stella Sapiente, drops on Friday, October 13. There could be no better date for a Lillingtons album to come out. Especially this Lillingtons album.
Whereas Death by Television was all about horror, B-movies, and vintage sci-fi, and Backchannel Broadcast was about spy shit, Stella Sapiente is perhaps the perfect Lillingtons theme album to come out in the year 2017. It’s about the Illuminati, secret societies, the occult, conspiracy theories, and astrology. And the band hasn’t missed a beat in putting together an album’s worth of quality punk.
It’s one of the best-produced punk albums of the year, and while there are some mid-tempo and slower, stripped-down songs that might be new for the band, it never sounds like anything less than exactly what you want a new Lillingtons album to sound like.
We’re pleased to present an exclusive full-album stream of Stella Sapiente. You can pick up the album for yourself on Friday the 13th.
Stella Sapiente is out 10/13 via Fat Wreck Chords. Get it here.
