Chicago’s very own Knuckle Puck has stunned listeners with their abrasive new single, “Nice to Know Ya.” Released through Pure Noise Records on Jan. 23, Knuckle Puck revisits the unstable beginning of the group’s earliest days, reminiscent of excitable energy in tense situations.
Paired with intense electric guitar usage, the steady bass and snare drums pair perfectly with the varying styles lead vocalist Joe Taylor delivers each verse. Knuckle Puck’s “Nice to Know Ya” stands as an alluring release, as the song’s lyrics and instrumentation imitate early 2000s pop-punk songs such as “Dirty Little Secret” by The All-American Rejects, or “All the Small Things” by blink-182. The band shares more about the song:
“When writing ‘Nice to Know Ya,’ we tried to take an older approach by keeping it as out-of-the-box as we could. This includes uglier chords, a spoken verse, and push-pull lyrics to match the juxtaposition of the verse and chorus. One of our goals for this band originally was to keep the listener guessing with our songwriting, something we are excited to bring back with this song.”
Certain areas of the song are intentionally intensified, such as in the second verse when Taylor introduces a spoken verse through a breathless, raspy voice using a seemingly sarcastic tone to mock the current state of society: “Everyone wants to know / what it feels like to be a rockstar / I say I’m doing great / and crack a smile like a fucking politician.” These two hard-hitting lines in verse 2 are not only amplified through spoken word, but also give listeners a clear idea of the group’s inner struggle.
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