What's Up [CD]

Told Slant - What's Up [CD]

Felix Walworth was born on Broome Street. Before they were a fixture of New York City's 2010s DIY circuit, before they adopted their signature standing bass drum on a keyboard stand, before they wrote piercing reflections on identity that earned cult followings from kids on Tumblr, they were a kid growing up across the boroughs, growing to love a city that eventually became unrecognizable. What's Up is Walworth's fourth album as Told Slant, the moniker under which, since 2012, they've released aching albums of spacious, raw-nerves indie rock. This is their New York record: a collection of songs about watching your hometown change and feeling the ways it has in turn changed you.

Across songs like "Manhattan," "Draw Blood," "Three Anchovies," and the title track, Walworth captures grief, anger, devotion, and fleeting moments of connection, tracing the disappearance of beloved neighborhoods, DIY spaces, friendships, and ways of life with equal parts heaviness and humor.

What's Up is also Told Slant's most collaborative and adventurous record to date. Built over a month in a makeshift upstate studio and recorded primarily to an eight-track reel-to-reel, it is the project's first mostly analog release, featuring contributions from Hannah Pruzinsky, Jonny Baker, Ceci Sturman, Hellen Ballentine, Emily Sprague, Mari Maurice, and Elijah Wolf.