The Bug Club Release Their Fifth Album, Every Single Muscle

The Bug Club, the Monmouthshire duo of Sam Willmett and Tilly Harris, return with their fifth album, Every Single Muscle. Across 18 tracks, the record continues the band’s habit of wrapping deadpan observations and surreal humor in deceptively tight garage rock. There’s a darker thread this time, as the pair lean into what they call body horror, from the album’s muscle-bound cover art to lyrics about peeled skin and exposed organs.

The band’s wit remains intact. “Miss Wales 2012” pokes at the strange devotion around beauty pageants, while “My Uncle Warren Drives A Passat” finds Willmett admitting jealousy of a greyhound’s anatomy. On paper, this could tip into novelty. The Bug Club avoid that by letting the music do real work. The songs shift through influences — the clipped nerviness of Minutemen on “Full Range of Motion,” a Sabbath-meets-Delta-bl