This debut album from Dream Wife is solid rather than anything new, but it’s a solid solid, and as they seem to be cool, we predict big things for this.

Dream Wife are an all-woman trio (Rakel Mjöll on lead vocals, Alice Go on guitar and Bella Podpadec on bass), not named after an old Cary Grant film. They produce exciting scuzzy riffs, with plenty of interesting bits (it’s a technical term) and melody, and combine old school indie punk with a more modern slickness.

We’re cynical and wizened in the Review Corner, but we can imagine our 14-year-old selves falling in love with this. Our favourite by a long way is the glorious FUU (Fever Dream), in which the “UU” stands for “U Up” and the first word is a short one we can’t print: the lyric is the title repeated, interspersed with “Gonna Cut You up”. Another early standout is Fire, with a gloriously rackety guitar riff intro that captures the essence of the band — three mates sat in a studio making a noise. We think comparisons with The Slits/Kleenex/Siouxsie, young readers may prefer Pixies/Breeders/Elastica.

It’s worth noting they technically have no drummer (they hire one) — the sound is all about the guitars, vocals and noisy bits.

https://dreamwife.bandcamp.com/