In our July 2024 interview with Robber Robber, Nina Cates outlined the conditions that would allow the band, which she co-founded with Zack James, to tap into their ideal workflow. “One of our goals in making music over the next couple of years is to have an infrastructure in place for our lives so we can be in positions to do that,” she said. Not half a year later, the building that the couple lived in caught fire, and though theirs was the only apartment that was spared major structural damage, all of it was demolished, leaving them displaced. Relying on the generosity of the Vermont music community, they couch surfed for months, and while that infrastructure may have now seemed like a distant dream, music remained their only constant – “a new familiar place,” to quote ‘Backup Plan’ from their first LP, Wild Guess. Once again, the pair, along with guitarist Will Krulak and bassist Carney Hemler, returned to Little Jamaica Studios to lay down their new album for Fire Talk, Two Wheels Move the Soul, with engineer Benny Yurco. At once groovier and grimier than their debut, it hammers down on the same themes of shaky communication and perpetual unrest as if almost no time has passed between records. Yet through the rubble, they find new ways to navigate their shared space. 

1. The Sound It Made

The restless volatility that fuels ‘The Sound It Made’ sets the tone for Two Wheels Move the Soul. As Cates’ stream of consciousness flits between extremes, the rubbery bass and shuffling drums match its persistent rhythm; a simple guitar pattern drags along, only for the instrument to bend a storm to its will, tightly coiled and distorted, during the bridge. Cates’ nonchalant delivery over increasingly chopped-and-screwed production is comparable to Water From Your Eyes’ It’s a Beautiful Place, so you wonder how far Robber Robber’s sound will have traveled by the time they reach their seventh album.

2. Avalanche Sound Effect

For a song that appears scrappy and repetitive, the overall effect is strangely particular. It builds tension not by mounting like an avalanche – that would be too obvious, though the titular sound effect, presumably emulated, is stitched in right before the climax – but through fussy repetition and monosyllabic lyrics. Even two-syllable words seem to be broken down, almost like directional commands: “Up/end.” As the rhythm section becomes more muscular and busy, the harmonies Cates layers on top of her main vocals are gentler, not rigid, preserving that bit of humanity in the midst of catastrophe. 

3. New Year’s Eve

‘New Year’s Eve’ throbs and hypnotizes in familiar Robber Robber style, but the real swagger of the groove allows you to catch your breath. “I’m tired, so is everyone/ How can I complain?” Cates sings, turning burnout into an opportunity for commiseration. But rather than keeping cool in a slacker zone, the song spins around an honest-to-God pop song melody in the chorus, and Cates’ voice reaches a stirring high as it laments the passage of time. Staring down the New Year, she pleads: “Won’t you let me sink my teeth instead of playing round the ends?” 

4. Imprint 

Just under a minute long, ‘Imprint’ floats past like a fragment of an argument never uttered, as it might appear on the edge of sleep.

5. Watch for Infection

Underneath the scorching fuzz of bass and guitars, Cates lays out a cautionary tale that still takes the form of a surreal vision, pressing on the slippery nature of memory. The bitterness festering in the first half of the track softens as she repeats the titular words, implying that the emotion itself is the cause for concern. 

6. It’s Perfect Out Here in the Sun 

If “It’s a perfect out here in the sun” seems a bit like a chorus Damon Albarn would sing after a wordy verse, it might have to do with the song’s rudimentary groove resembling a Gorillaz hit. Nothing about this lumbering tune sounds synthetic, though; you can feel the dirt vibrating off James’ percussion, which is slyly unpredictable. Every element seems on the verge of collapsing under the heat, crashing out for a beat before the surprisingly sweeping outro. They might as well have titled it ‘Icarus’. 

7. Pieces

Cates peels the curtain back on the headspace behind her lyrics: “Caught me stewing in the sound of it/ Not thinking what it meant,” she sings. Meaning is always secondary in Robber Robber’s music, and even ‘Pieces’ keeps the identity of “it” elusive. The band chews on the feeling behind her words, beefy guitar notes lingering with no discernible logic. It might be the hardest track to latch onto, but there’s another half-illuminating couplet: “We’ll take something for the dissonance/ And something for the dream that you forgot.”

8. Talkback

Rightly released as its first preview, ‘Talkback’ still stands out as the best song on the LP. Cates’ nagging self-consciousness comes into sharp focus, almost neatly sequenced: she recognizes the opportunity for the perfect retort has passed, then lets the moment go. The irony, in the context of the album, is that here is where some of the nervousness actually diffuses. 

9. Enough

Cates’ fiery conviction persists, mirrored by a particularly sturdy groove where every hit seems designed to snap you out of a dissociative state. “I’d try a lot to start feeling like myself again,” Cates sings, easing back as tight chords give way to jagged notes and finally arpeggios. 

10. Again

A shining example of the band’s playful conversationalism, ‘Again’ might be the most lighthearted song on Two Wheels. The premise is simple: “Lean in, or go/ I’ll settle into sickness till you know.” ‘Again’ finds Cates running off, wandering around, almost tripping over, and telling everything to a can above her head. Again, “everything” could be anything – for now, at least, she can pretend it’s no big deal. 

11. Bullseye

You have to squint a little less hard to make out the scene unfolding in ‘Bullseye’, where the setting could plausibly be one of the band’s shows. Musically, it’s a bit of an oddity, grungy and melodic, but you get its placement as the closer as soon as the shrieking bridge explodes. It’s one hell of an exit.