Keep Your Cool [LP] (Beer Color With Black Splatter Vinyl)

Riley! - Keep Your Cool [LP] (Beer Color With Black Splatter Vinyl)

It doesn't take much more than a minute for Riley! to impress on Keep Your Cool, their new album and debut for label Counter Intuitive Records. Its opening track--a love song about unhealthy vices, "777"--bursts into focus with a blistering, vocal lashing before transitioning effortlessly into a dopamine-rush anthem. This is merely one example of the kind of "freak shit" you can come to expect from vocalist/guitarist Ryan Bluhmm (they/them), bassist Kris Gallardo (he/him), and drummer Cesar "Izzy" Izaguirre (they/them). Elsewhere, like on first single "Keep Your Cool, Man," Riley! doesn't hold back on the dramatics; Bluhm said it's meant to capture the feeling that everything is always happening all the time and way too fast, and they nail it.

Pulling inspiration from bands like Glocca Morra, Algernon Cadwalladar, Hot Mulligan, Prince Daddy & the Hyena, and more, Keep Your Coolmasters a balance between tongue-in-cheek playfulness--like on the anti-work anthem "Kill Yr Boss"--and critical self-accountability--"guess I'm just a fucking asshole / throw me in a black hole," they violently shout on "Die Mad."

Tracklist
777
Keep Your Cool, Man
Bad Boys Boxing Club
Kill Yr Boss
[cries in spanish]
Ego Peek Mid
Die Mad
Eat Your Heart Out
God is an Algorithm and I'm Fighting for Attention with a Million Strangers on the Internet
Talk It Out