New Music: Painted Dog – Midnight City

Midnight City is Pittsburgh’s post-punk outfit Painted Dog at their most menacing and darkly manic.

Vocalist James has the presence of a youthful Nick Cave or Jeffrey Lee Pierce, a voice that howls like he’s rattling at the gates of hell, demanding entrance.

That Bad Seeds/Gun Club comparison continues into the mutated country guitar riffs, and while the band themselves describe their music as containing elements of cowpunk, Midnight City is really more of an exercise in world-building that is distinctly noirish and satirical in tone.

Says James, “[Midnight City] was actually written with another single to go back-to-back with it, titled Midnight Rose. I like to call them The Midnight Singles.

Midnight City is one of our songs that is a bit more lyrically straightforward. It is a song about someone who has delusions of grandeur surrounding a destination. It’s a bit lyrically humorous, while ultimately not being a joke of a song.”

For album and band news from Painted Dog, follow them on their Instagram. Midnight City and Midnight Rose are out now via Play Alone Records to stream on Bandcamp, YouTube, and Spotify.