Album Review: Moontype, Bodies of Water

On their debut album, Bodies of Water, Moontype sets intimate storytelling to minimalistic pop-punk (think Buzzcocks, not New Found Glory), low-fi shoegaze, and laid-back folk. It’s a lot of sonic ground for the Chicago trio to cover. But its members are experts at blending adjacent musical genres, turning ideas that sound weird on paper into rowdy and friendly rock songs. Whether they’re transitioning a yearning acoustic track into fuzzy melodic punk or finding commonalities between Fleetwood Mac and the Minutemen, Moonlight takes listeners on an easy and fulfilling ride with thrilling highs, cathartic lows, and low-key surprises.

The best bands play as a close-knit unit — unless you happen to be the drummer in this band — but a trio lives or dies on the harmony of its members. Moontype sounds tight as a snare drum on Bodies of Water despite its members’ divergent influences; Margaret McCarthy’s restless vocals find a home in the steady drumming Emerson Hunton, while Ben Cruz’s eclectic guitar riffs hold it all together or blast it all into space, depending on his mood. On “Blue Michigan,” which might be the album’s dreariest moment, echoing guitars wind through and in-between McCarthy’s vocal line, deepening the down-tempo track’s emotional pull into melancholy.

While the band has a knack for bittersweet ballads, the trio mostly teams up to produce fidgety punk, ‘70s pop-rock, and ‘80s alternative in the vein of the Pixies and Sonic Youth. The opener, “Anti-Divinity,” projects the scrappy energy of a band having fun in the garage, while “Lush” has McCarthy listing off everyday moments to the rhythm of distorted palm-mutes and rollicking drums. The band executes their potent concoction of guitar, drums, and bass with air-tight efficiency, squeezing every last drop of melody out of their uncomplicated pop framework.

While Moontype’s all-for-one-one-for-all approach leaves no room for heroes, McCarthy’s merit as a singer/songwriter is hard to miss (she told Post-Trash that she wrote many of the album’s songs in her bedroom on bass guitar). McCarthy’s lyrics, which feel like a sneak-peek into a well-written diary, reflect those intimate origins. Her playful sexual one-liners on “About You” lighten the mood: “Lookin' at you with my fuck me eyes / Do you want to get inside of mine?” But they never detract from her true gift as a storyteller, who’s able to paint a scene in screenplay-level detail: “And you tell me you quit smoking / And I say your name out loud / Cause I'm happy for you also cause I like the way your name feels in my mouth,” she sings on “3 Weeks” over fingerpicked guitar and drum-brushed snares. While Moontype largely keeps Bodies of Water lean and filled with hooks, the epic, seven-minute-plus finale “Me and My Body” hints at expansive sonic possibilities yet to come.

Listen to Bodies of Water on Bandcamp below.