Last night (September 27th), out of nowhere, a baby pink light hurtled into our consciousness: Salem’s debut single ‘Destroy Me’. And who exactly are Salem? The duo consists of Will Gould, frontman of British punk band Creeper, and close friend Matt Reynolds (Howard’s Alias, Skylar, Drawings) – although Gould hints at some other talented presences behind the scenes, including Ranny Ransom, Aaron Graham and Neil Kennedy. Salem follows Creeper’s spectacular second album, Sex, Death & The Infinite Void, after their various plans for promotion and touring had to be postponed, the 2020 effect. You can listen to it below.
The announcement of Salem comes with the promise of a debut EP coming next month (October 23), and in this regard, we actually have lockdown to be grateful for. Following the intensity of putting out Sex, Death & The Infinite Void, Gould locked himself away with Reynolds and poured out songs. With the intention of stripping back from the conceptual complexity of Creeper’s second album, Gould says that all the songs that we will get to hear next month were written in an hour.
They were never really intended for release, though – it was only when Gould began to get restless with their plans on hold, that this project re-entered his periphery. Gould told NME, “everyone is doing boring shit in bands at the moment, just sat on top of a washing machine with an acoustic guitar doing a live-stream and I hate it.” Automatically rebelling against this way of continuing his career through lockdown, Gould pulled an album out of his sleeve. In essence, Salem is the result of seriously blowing off some steam, and from the opening chord of ‘Destroy Me’, this massive release of energy begins.
Creeper’s second album actually was difficult for Gould, not that this is reflected in what they ultimately created. It is a talented and varied explosion of punk, covering everything from dynamic, guitar-led tracks to the ballad-like ‘All My Friends’, whose fantastic opening line is the album title “sex, death and the infinite void”. It had five singles. Oh, and if this wasn’t enough, it’s a concept album about the seven deadly sins, partially inspired by tv show Twin Peaks.
‘Destroy Me’ is more like all of the talent with less of the concept (even then, its release is accompanied by a high quality music video with a distinct aesthetic). Bittersweet Press are absolutely on the money with their description: “a perfect debut single”.
thank you all for spreading the good word of the @Church_of_Salem today, love you guys!
someone spiked the holy water and now we’re all fuckin’ drinking it xx
— William Gould (@willghould) September 28, 2020
You can’t quite imagine how ‘Destroy Me’ will make you feel until you listen to it; it’s instantly catchy. It sounds urgent and the guitar races through three short minutes (the lyrics, incidentally, are pretty racy). To my mind, ‘Destroy Me’ strikes that excellent balance between novelty and highly-talented-artists-taking-a-new-direction. Actually, it sounds like the few moments that we heard My Chemical Romance really let down their hair in the last two decades. Even though it’s very on brand for me to throw around My Chemical Romance allusions left, right and centre, I noticed this because Gould had previously told NME about the pressure Creeper felt because “everyone was talking about us like we were going to be the next My Chemical Romance.”
And yeah, ‘Destroy Me’ is a bit reminiscent of My Chemical Romance, or AFI, or even any number of early 2000s British guitar bands. Ultimately, though, Will Gould is far, far more than the sum of his musical influences, or the pressure to be like them. On its own, ‘Destroy Me’ is a fantastic spark of uncontainable energy. In comparison to Sex, Death & The Infinite Void, it’s a completely different display of Gould’s talent, equally uncontainable. He says that Salem “runs the opposite way to Creeper.” Gould is in a league of his own; he doesn’t even need to compete with himself.
