Even before releasing any music, Boston-based pop punk band Yeehaw! had a pretty decent following on social media. That might be because of their “otherworldly” talents or the fact that they’ve already been orbiting around a bit, so to speak. What I’m trying to tell you, is that they’re aliens. Maybe.
In one of their first Facebook statuses, they hint at the anomaly: “300 likes. No recorded music. No merch. We are nothing. #aliennation.” That was in April. A mere four months later they released their debut album Demotivational Speaker (download available for pay-as-you-please) and were venturing out on their first tour alongside the NY based pop punk band Everything Ever.
“We started this band when a few of our other bands were playing a show on Mars and we got in a fender bender with our spaceships,” says bearded alien drummer Alex Pickert, over a cup of coffee at Pavement — which was weird because I wouldn’t peg aliens as coffee drinkers. He continues: “We all became really good friends very fast. No jokes ever.”
Since then, their overall Internet fanbase has more than doubled, and while that may be because each status update, tweet, and tumblr post is more entertaining than the last, it’s probably got a lot more to do with the fact that these guys are really great live. I can attest to that after seeing them play a sketchy house show in Revere this summer, their set being the highlight of the night. Just a bunch of sweaty space cowboys clad in all black playing their hearts out, being emotional and yelling about it. If you stop by their show this Sunday — a bill that includes Sorority Noise and Pinegrove – you may recognize a few of the Yeehaw! boys, as they all belong to other bands in the wonderfully incestuous Berklee music scene.
Yeehaw!’s impressive debut Demotivational Speaker is, dare I say it, out of this world. Singers Dylan Ewen (of The Sulk Scouts) and Matt Politoski (of Animal Flag) hold true to the band’s self-proclaimed sad boy mentality — kind of hard not to while apathetically moaning lyrics like, “I don’t know why I’m so empty inside / I guess I realized that there’s no point to my life.” When I asked about the reason behind the title, Pickert replies, “In all seriousness, it kinda sums up our vibe pretty perfectly. Sad songs that sound happy.”
And in my opinion, you can never really have too many of those.
YEEHAW! + SORORITY NOISE + PINEGROVE. DEMOCRACY CENTER, 45 MOUNT AUBURN ST., CAMBRIDGE. 7PM/ALL AGES/$8-10. DEMOCRACYCENTER.ORG