Track by Track: TV FACE – WOLF RENTS BARK

Published On: September 6th, 2025|

The new album from Lancaster trio TV FACE, WOLF RENTS BARK, is noisy punk with a primal edge, full-on rage, and a sharp eye for snappy titles and killer riffs. Atari Teenage Riot clash head-on with DC hardcore and the 80s doom of Killing Joke.

A big thank you from us at AnalogueTrash to the band for taking part in our Track by Track feature.

Get What We’re Given

“I finally find a place I can breathe in, I shut my mouth and get what I’m given.”

This song plays on a few similar sayings: “you’ll get what you’re given,” “you’ll get nothing and like it,” and “you’ll get out what you put in.” We’re told to work hard and we’ll be rewarded, but that’s not the reality that many of us face.

We are forced to relinquish collective power the more our individual lives are under threat. For instance, when the energy bills went up to pay for disgustingly high shareholder dividends, there should have been countrywide protests, but most of us just quietly went without warmth.

Boots Pocket Coffin

“Fill your boots, fill your pocket, fill your coffin.”

A horror-tinged swaggering floor-filler, we love that this song doesn’t have any singing in the chorus. It’s a song about the frantically voracious and unquenchable appetites of the super-rich for whom the world is not enough, inspired by Goya’s painting of Saturn devouring his son … but don’t let that stop you from getting down to this sexy slab of noise.

Millipede

“You better book yourself a sideshow Bob, ‘cause you’re acting like a clown.”

The first song we wrote together in this new line-up. A song that draws on inspiration from Carlo Collodi’s Pinocchio, The Simpsons, and a decimated and polarised culture, where conversation and connection have died.

Hug Like A Critic

“You wear your skin like a restraint, like a jacket put on backward.”

This song sees us get a little more personal, but let’s not forget the personal is political! This one is about our own experiences of self-annihilation, about being totally uncomfortable in our own skin and around other bipeds. But it’s also about the normalisation and even celebration of self-destruction that people seem to love to feed on for entertainment.

Scottish Kisses

“Easily lied to, easily led, plimsolls and pasties, Shoe Zone and Greggs, loot for the masses, balm for the dregs.”

We rage against the rise of fascism and the far right in this song. Written in response to the nationalist and racist riots that followed the Stockport murders in 2024. The lyrics are the most explicit about something of all the songs on the record. A year on, things are getting worse, and it’s devastating.

White Noise White Lies

“It loves like hemlock, thinks it’s better than everyone…”

Put simply, this is a protest song about Big Streaming. It’s a song about the destruction of creative diversity and grassroots music communities.

Happy New Year

“Wake scrape floor, learn world fast, wolf rents bark, sharp rent hike.”

Happy New Year is about the loss of innocence. We approached writing the lyrics by setting the restriction that there could only be three syllables per line in the verses. We unfolded a tale of the passing of a life from birth to total disillusionment.

It also gives us the title of the album, WOLF RENTS BARK, which refers to the corporate takeover of governments across the world, with politician-CEOs cosplaying as “the man next door” while extracting wealth at pace.

I Am Horse

I Am Horse was one of the last songs to be finished for the album, and it was a difficult song to write. If you heard early iterations, you would not recognise it even though it’s the same bass line. It is our phoenix from the flames, and we love it.

It’s about living in a post-truth world, and (again) the super-rich crashing the markets, then laughing about how much money they made in the process while the rest of us rot.

Ways To Pass The Time

“Man, you’re so disgusting, but you don’t mind. Peaceful, peaceful baby, out of time.”

This song was written in response to images of a Palestinian father carrying the decapitated body of his dead child out of the flames after they were bombed in tents as they slept. The world looks away as genocide continues and disaster capitalists continue to profit from war, over a year after we wrote this.

TV FACE play The Peer Hat in Manchester on the 3rd of October. WOLF RENTS BARK is available in vinyl and digital formats on Bandcamp, with the added chance to pick up a test pressing. Hit up TV FACE on Facebook, BlueSky, and Instagram for album news and details of upcoming live dates.