Adelaide band Twine have released a great new single today called ‘Sleeping Dogs‘. It’s a track that sits at the nexus of ragged alt-country and noisier underground rock music. My initial thought was that their sound reminded me of the band Wednesday and then I read that their forthcoming album New Old Horse, out Friday, December 6 via Kitty Records, was mixed by Alex Farrar who has worked with both Wednesday and man of the moment MJ Lenderman.

I’m digging the mix of slacker vibes, melancholic violin and those fuzz-saturated electric guitars. The song staggers and sways along before it ambles upward into a victorious chorus complete with a Neil Young falsetto at one point, and brief injections of chaotic noise. The back end of the song collapses in a glorious, tangled mess of deconstructed drums and distorted sonic detritus.

According to the band… ‘Sleeping Dogs’ is a guttural and melancholic examination of returning home after a period away, realising that your pains and dissatisfactions are still there, waiting for you. This exasperation manifests itself in images of oceans that “dribble”, a leash pulling at one’s neck, and in the stomping chorus: “sleeping dogs don’t dream / of living inside”. The howl at the end of the chorus was inspired by the folk musician Michael Hurley. “It’s an outpouring of emotion and a positive letting go of anguished feelings,” says Katsaras.