Throwing Muses are back to their esoteric best on Moonlight Concessions, more proof that even after all these years, no one else sees the world quite like they do.
Some bands play by the rules, and some refuse to. Throwing Muses’ mastermind Kristin Hersh has always been the latter. For over four decades, her band has thrived in the shadows of the mainstream, shaping their own brand of jaggedly sharp yet poetic rock. Moonlight Concessions is full of that same off-kilter intensity; equal parts searing and surreal, but still deeply human.
Following 2020’s Sun Racket, Moonlight Concessions finds the Muses stripping it all back to the bone to let Hersh’s elliptical storytelling and the band’s frenetic arrangements take center stage. Produced by Hersh at Steve Rizzo's Stable Sound Studio in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, the record pulls from the everyday - the overheard conversations, late-night revelations, and fleeting moments that stick like burrs in the subconscious. It’s Raymond Carver by way of post-punk: fragmented but fiercely alive.
Lead track “Drugstore Drastic” captures that spirit perfectly with its roadside monologue unraveling in real time, sketched out over a nervous acoustic strum and an undercurrent of restless guitar. Album opener “Summer Of Love” was born from a bet over whether the seasons actually change us, unfolding into a haunting, baroque-tinged meditation on memory and metamorphosis. Meanwhile, “Libretto” layers strings over hushed acoustics, a slow burn of longing and page-turning pathos.
Written between the hazy heat of the Gulf of Mexico and the cozy coastline of Southern California, Moonlight Concessions absorbs the glow of its surroundings. “In New Orleans, the stars look greenish-blue, swamp-lit,” Hersh explains. “On Moonlight Beach, they glow icy white. All these songs were written in those two places, which helped our sonic technique find itself.” That duality - lush and desolate, intimate yet untouchable - has always been central to Throwing Muses’ magic.