'Premonition' by White Lung
The Vancouver punk-rock band White Lung actually had begun working on its fifth album, Premonition, not long after it had finished touring its fourth album, 2016’s Paradise. And it wasn’t the pandemic that initially paused the band; it was a positive pregnancy test for singer Mish Barber-Way.
One son and one daughter later, Premonition is now also the final White Lung album, and it favors dark urgency. Barber-Way’s bandmates ensure it: Kenneth William brings edgy melodicism via guitar, bass, and synthesizer, while Anne-Marie Vassiliou is as steady and driving a presence as one could want behind the drumkit.
Barber-Way leans into them in a familiar way, with one crucial difference resulting from the pregnancy: by her own admission, Premonition features the first set of vocals she’s recorded without any alcohol in her system. Her diction, her rasp, and her capacity to soar just above ground don’t lose anything from that absence.
In its place? Perspective in Barber-Way’s lyrics: amid rapidly torn-off riffs, she uses “Bird” as a message to the baby kicking insider her belly; in the receding waters of emo-pop keyboard tides, she studies herself and visions of another “Under Glass”; and over-cranked churning in both rhythm and tune give her a good backdrop for her description of going out with God on a “Date Night.”
Producer Jesse Gander has produced other White Lung albums, but he acknowledges the differences in these songs and continues the expansion of Paradise. “Hysteric” opens the album with the gallop of classic Bad Religion, but other songs, including “Mountain,” allow for slower thinking and playing.
Really, with the punk variety on offer—it’s not difficult to hear shades of The Distillers and Sleater-Kinney—Premonition sounds like a promise of more, not a farewell. Fortunately, it also sounds like a good way to remember White Lung.
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