Miesha and the Spanks - Unconditional Love in Hi-Fi
Mint Records
Released April 14th, 2023
On their newest record Unconditional Love in Hi-Fi, Calgary garage-punk duo Meisha and the Spanks serve up a riff-heavy and brash collection of sweaty rock n’ roll. Busting with coarse power and tongue-in-cheek attitude, this album is a testament to the band's ability to create infectious, adrenaline-fueled music, while touching upon some very personal themes of self-love, motherhood, and ambition.
Consisting of frontwoman and guitarist Miesha Louie backed by hard-hitting drummer Sean Hamilton, Miesha and the Spanks are a collision of crunchy guitar lines and catchy power-pop vocal melodies with bombastic head-banging rhythms. As you’d expect if you know them from their energetic live show, the duo wastes no time in delivering their signature satisfying fusion of garage rock, punk, and grunge, peppering their songs with catchy hooks and singalong ooohs in just the right spots. Toes-in-the-sand summer jam “I Can’t Wait” serves as a prime example, capturing the raw energy of their live performances while maintaining a polished sound. And the ever-present rebel attitude of the band is evident on tracks like “So Mad,” which leans towards bubblegum grunge with the snot-nosed refrain “I got something to prove / I got nothing to lose,” or in the foot-stomp and sneer of “Heart Is On Fire,” which recalls vintage Bif Naked.
Meisha leans into some very personal songwriting on this album, with several tracks touching on themes of anticolonialism and indigeneity. “Bully” calls out gatekeepers and admonishes the toxic social media bullshit of their lateral violence – “what happened to power in the blood? / I thought we shared it?” The more exploratory “Bear Kids” tells the story of Meisha losing her father, and of the continuity of life through death and rebirth.
Another focus of the album is on motherhood, and the double binds of being a parent without losing oneself. As the feverish track “s7elkst” bleeds into “Enough is Enough,” listeners will be enveloped in the swirling refrain of “Be a good mama / Keep a career / Make time for your love / Make time for yourself” with a circular intensity that makes it fairly obvious that these things are impossible to simultaneously juggle without feeling like a fuckup in some portion. Electric banger “Mom Jeans // Mom Genes” is a terrific anthem of parenthood for aging punks, and the intense dichotomies of crushing responsibility and overwhelming love: “I can feel it in my guts / Something fierce / Something strong / Like I would give it all.”
There is also a thread of that Unconditional Love being pointed inward, and a theme of self-love and naked ambition is woven throughout the album. On “It’s My Year,” Miesha wears her aspirations on her sleeve, and lays bare some clear intentions for her self: “No I will not stand in my way / I wanna see some change / I got a feeling that I won’t if I stay.” Along the way, Miesha and Sean also practice humour and grace, cutting themselves some slack for all the failed plans and responsible adult things they haven’t gotten around to yet (see “I Was Gonna”). The strength and connection of these lyrical themes lends a real cohesiveness to the whole record, and coupled with Miesha and the Spanks’ energizing and empowering approach to no-nonsense rock n’ roll, there is a lot to love in Unconditional Love in Hi-Fi.
- Julie Maier
