For every four out of five “country punks” now walking around Nashville in agreement that Lawrenceburg, Tennessee-based alt-country/indie rock quintet The Country Punks reached a 15-year evolutionary pinnacle with the release of their third studio album, Psychic Says (released out of DistroKid in May 2023), there’s still one banging out hooks on an old Casio keyboard at 3 a.m. screaming “it still ain’t good enough!”
A brainchild of frontman Ty Gang, The Country Punks have honed a sound that resonates with colloquial weirdness—a fascination with The Strokes’ first Rolling Stone articles, a Lou Reed-leaning vocal style and guitarist Tyler Hill’s Chuck Berry/Albert Hammond Jr.-inspired riffs. The group of hometown friends have spent the past 15 years punching out song arrangements, transplanting their distinct musical vision from the late-aughts Murfreesboro scene to Nashville, and going on to record Psychic Says in Muscle Shoals, Alabama.
Time itself is ready for change / In the next life you’re gonna shake that thing, frantically opens the album, with Gang delving into existential paradoxes and drawing inspiration from biblical concepts to navigate self-imposed races against time, somehow balancing all of that with the Punks’ uptempo pace, some “oi, oi”s and soothing strings.
Psychic Says traverses honky-tonk numbers and surfer jams, each song sounding as if it were recorded in the back of a Blazer or inside a barrel.
But another lyrical paradox comes soon enough in “Peroxide Blonde,” as Gang explores the modern curse of selling one’s soul while seeking love.
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The standout track “Put a Record On” channels the spirit of Leonard Cohen, while Psychic Says’ answer to “Free Bird” is an eight-minute version of “Pills in My Pocket,” which was a two-minute version on the 2010 Country Punks debut E.P. that started this whole endeavor.
Find Psychic Says by The Country Punks—in addition to Gang and Hill, also made up of children’s book author and Perry Countian Justin Webb on rhythm, Will Pettus on bass and Brock Benson, formerly of Murfreesboro’s Pee Pee Skin, on the skins—on Spotify, YouTube Music, Apple Music and iHeart. The Country Punks’ recent sporadic live performances have included engagements at American Legion Post 82 in Inglewood and East Nashville’s The 5 Spot, and the band has possibly, slowly formed an alliance with several other Murfreesboro-area bands; more to come on that scene soon.
