Goon Tickets

Music can be catharsis and a refuge both, a way to expel the pain of a tragic situation and also to find comfort in the creation of something beautiful. With their new single, the haunting, autumnal "Death Spells," Goon occupies both of these spaces, evokes an experience of immense pain and the journey through to the first steps of healing.

Goon began in 2015 as singer and multi-instrumentalist Kenny Becker's solo project, releasing a compilation of his best home recordings, the 2016 EP Dusk of Punk. With a full band in tow, Goon released the band's first full-length, 2019's Heaven is Humming on Partisan Records, followed by the self-released Paint By Numbers 1. Becker recruited a new band—Andy Polito on drums, Dillon Peralta on guitar, and Tamara Simons on bass—releasing a second LP, Hour of Green Evening, as well as another EP, Red Ladder, in 2022.

To support Hour of Green Evening, Goon hit the road hard, touring and playing shows with Built to Spill, Jadu Heart, Slow Pulp, Teethe, Squirrel Flower, and many others. In the midst of all this, the band signed with Philadelphia label Born Losers and began recording their next LP with Claire Morison at Wild Horizon Sounds in Los Angeles. The new album brings together the more intimate, lo-fi stylings of Goon with the live-band sound of Hour of Green Evening, pushing the band into fresh territory.

"There has always been this part of Goon that has been very homemade, four-track recorder vibes," says Becker, "along with the more band-oriented stuff from the last record. Working with Claire has given us the opportunity to combine the best of both worlds and come up with something new."

The result is an often darker, more introspective album, built on personal loss and the chaotic crumbling of the outside world, without losing Goon's signature sense of strangeness and wonder. Weaving lyrics about ecological collapse with references to baseball, aliens, and Tony Soprano, the record seeks to expand Goon's sound while holding close to the core identity of the band. The album offers a carefully-crafted sonic world, one full of heartbreak and pain, but also brimming with color and life, the hope of better days to come.

To celebrate their new label signing and their forthcoming LP, Goon is releasing an independent single, "Death Spells." The song was recorded over a two-week period in October, also with Claire Morison. Coming off a difficult time in his life, Becker felt it important for the whole band to present for the recording, even inviting Becker's old friend (and the band's original guitarist) Drew Eccleston to sing harmonies. After spending over a year on the forthcoming full-length, Becker wanted to record quickly, running on a pure burst of inspiration.