Superchunk

Brudenell presents Superchunk at Brudenell Social Club on 28 June 2026 at 18h00. “Bruised Lung.” “No Hope.” “Care Less.” “Climb the Walls.” “Everybody Dies.” Scanning the tracklist of Songs in the Key of Yikes, one is given to wonder: Is Superchunk okay? In a world that’s arguably darker than the one that greeted Wild Loneliness in 2022 or What a Time to Be Alive in 2018, are any of us okay?

“It’s always been the case that everyone is going through something that you may not be aware of,” notes Mac McCaughan. “This is currently more true than ever—but also the case that we are all going through some things together. In the face of that, what good is art and where is happiness found? (Spoiler alert: I don’t know.)”

In seeking an answer, Songs in the Key of Yikes unleashes a sound that is bright in the darkness. Lead single “Is It Making You Feel Something” sets the tone early with the band—McCaughan, Laura Ballance, Jim Wilbur, and Laura King—building from the potential for joy, diving into slop-polluted waters (“now fakes are faking everything / that once made your poor heart sing”).

“No Hope” is similarly resilient, McCaughan’s lyrics painting a crushing scene before entering its titular refrain. He repeats the phrase nine times, pauses a beat, and transforms its sentiment entirely, breaking the chant with the line “and here we are singing.” The lyric is sharp, at once a simple observation and a statement of being, the song’s crushing nights and endless days no less so on its account, but McCaughan’s voice finds a certain sweetness in having endured, and continuing to do so.

Paradoxically, the energy of Songs in the Key of Yikes peaks in “Stuck in a Dream,” which emerges between “Everybody Dies” and “Train on Fire.” “Care Less” is a dark, comic mirror to that energy, a garage-y jam in which an acid-tongued McCaughan seeks refuge from the storm by pretending it’s not raging right outside his door.

This strategy doesn’t work. The album, in addition to welcoming Laura King into the fold after two years as their touring drummer, features contributions from Rosali Middleman (“Bruised Lung” and “Everybody Dies”), Bella Quinlan and Holly Thomas of Quivers (“Cue”), and touring bassist Betsy Wright (“Care Less”). The album was engineered by Paul Voran (The Menzingers, Hurray for the Riff Raff) and Eli Webb, and mixed by Mike Montgomery (The Breeders, Protomartyr).