Upchuck – "I'm Nice Now"

When you think of punk, what comes to mind? It's undoubtedly not meant to be whispered, and it's absolutely not polite. It's the type of survival that comes from being told you don't matter and still screaming back, not the kind you buy at the merch table. Upchuck know this instinctively. Their Domino Records debut, "I'm Nice Now", is not a mellowing out, not a concession, not even an easing of the grip. It's the sound of rage retooled as resilience—punk as self-preservation.

"I'm Nice Now", the Atlanta-based band's third official full-length album, is less a step toward sweetness than a survival manual written in guitar feedback and guttural conviction. Frontwoman KT, whose voice can flip from serrated howl to smoke-stained croon in a single bar, has always carried rage as inheritance. On "I'm Nice Now", she doesn't abandon it—she sublimes it. The opener "Tired" is exactly that: a breathless sprint through exhaustion-as-resistance, two minutes of being crushed under the weight of darker news and still refusing to shut up. You can hear the sweat smashing to the walls at Sonic Ranch, where Ty Segall (credited here as Herman) recorded the band live-to-tape. Every guitar squall, every bass throb, every crash of Daniel Lane's kit feels less like a studio take than a barely-contained detonation. As KT herself lays it bare:

Upchuck – "I’m Nice Now"

13 songs, 30 minutes total, out on October 3rd 2025

With their new album, she and her band distilled that fury into something more vivid than fury itself: resilience.

The song, "Tired", that kicks the record off, feels like a community scream:

On the piece, "Forgotten Token", KT confronts racism, personal grief and invisibility:

Of the song, she says:

That blend of tenderness and confrontation is stark and wrenching.

What makes "I'm Nice Now" hit harder than its predecessors ("Sense Yourself", "Bite the Hand That Feeds") is how it expands Upchuck's vocabulary without sanding off any edges. "Forgotten Token," written after the loss of KT's sister, is bruised and furious, a dirge that grows fangs. KT's singsong howl collapses into a guttural growl before the whole band drags the song into a slow-motion breakdown—beautiful and unshakable.

Upchuck Frontfrau KT. Bild/Picture: © Michael Tyrone Delaney

Chris Salado steps forward in "Un Momento", bringing in raw hope:

Elsewhere, Upchuck play with texture and groove in ways that feel like a middle finger to genre orthodoxy. "New Case" bounces on a bassline funky enough to have wandered in from a Quincy Jones session before being fuzzed into oblivion. "Un Momento" and "Homenaje" push drummer Chris Salgado to the front, his Spanish-language verses colliding with KT's in a call-and-response of defiance. The result doesn't dilute Upchuck's punk—it broadens it, pulling in cumbia rhythms, garage crunch, and a sense of communal voice that refuses to be boxed in.

The title might sound tongue-in-cheek, but the record is less about niceness than necessity. KT has said that finding a way to stay "sane and sound enough to continue through this seemingly never-ending fight" is what matters. That's the real pulse of "I'm Nice Now": a band making music heavy enough to hold grief, wild enough to dance with it, sharp enough to cut through the static of American fuckery.

Upchuck don't offer escape. They don't want to. They want you to choke on the dirty air and then scream with them anyway. That's the closest thing to niceness they can offer. And it's precisely what we need.

Upchuck frontwoman KT. Bild/Picture: © Michael Tyrone Delaney

The album was tracked live to tape at Sonic Ranch Studio in the Texas desert—minimal overdubs, maximum urgency. Producer Ty (also known as Herman) pushed them to "exhaust everybody with the performance until it was correct," a process that allowed the band's raw edge to bleed through in every buzzing riff.

Here's why you need to listen to "I'm Nice Now"

I'm Nice Now doesn't compromise. It's rage repurposed, loss transmuted, and sound sharpened—but it's also hope. And there is also a sense of hope. The fight continues and is not yet lost. There's no niceness here in the sugar-coated sense. The only softness is in recognition—recognising pain, but refusing to be defined by it.

"I'm Nice Now" erscheint am 3. Oktober 2025. Auf Bandcamp findet Ihr bereits vier der insgesamt 13 Songs.

Upchuck – "I'm Nice Now"

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