stream HIRS LP ft. Shirley Manson, Laura Jane Grace, Marissa Paternoster & more

HIRS

Queer-grindcore collective HIRS are releasing their first full-length album, Friends. Lovers. Favorites., next week (4/20) via Get Better/SRA, and the whole thing is streaming now. It’s got 20 songs that clock in at under 15 minutes, and some very impressive guests. Via NPR’s writeup:

Friends. Lovers. Favorites. makes good on its title and opens HIRS’ membership to a noteworthy community of punk collaborators, allowing them to pen and scream their own lyrics. Garbage’s Shirley Manson offers a spoken word introduction to “Invisible,” which inspires a frenzied response, turning the invisibility of transgender persons on heteronormativity. “What Is Love Without Purpose” gives Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace an opportunity to be outrageously, hilariously filthy (“Baby doesn’t want a pudding; we all want a slamming”). Marissa Paternoster reminds us why her band is called Screaming Females with the absolutely shredding “Demagogues.” To hear RVIVR’s Erica Freas spit “Women in Hordes” at such rapidfire speed makes me wonder why she doesn’t have a grindcore side-project. While Sadie Switchblade‘s singer-songwriter project is absolutely worth your heart and ears, it’s thrilling to hear the former G.L.O.S.S. frontperson scream again on “Looking for a Fight.” And to have punk legends like Martin Sorrondeguy (a.k.a. Martin Crudo of Los Crudos and Limp Wrist), Alice Bag and Candace Hansen (Alice Bag & The Sissy Bears) lend their shrieks to Friends. Lovers. Favorites. truly ties together a long history of queer punk.

Listen to the album at NPR and watch the videos for two songs below.

HIRS are on tour now with Screaming Females and Thou, having just played Brooklyn this past weekend.