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La Sécurité
La Sécurité (Montréal/Tiohtià:ke) is a collective whose art punk is equal parts: jumpy beats, off-kilter arrangements and minimalistic melodic hooks; run through an insomniac filter, the result of excessive exposure to the city’s neon lights. The music is all about living dangerously, perfectly agreeable to being blasted onto dancefloors; while the lyrics share the ethos of the Riot Grrrl movement, and celebrate the autonomization of women, friends (mean and nice) as well as benevolence. Following the release of Polaris Music Prize 2024 long-listed debut Stay Safe! (June 16th, 2023)—as well as its joyous offspring Stay Safe! REMIXED (March 8th, 2024)—with Mothland, the five-piece offered singles “Detour” (October 22nd, 2024) and “Ketchup” (January 28th, 2025), setting the stage for a new influx of D.I.Y. sonic gems, this time also teaming up with Simon Raymonde’s seminal British imprint: Bella Union. Hence, the motley bunch continues to meander the fringes of punk, new wave and krautrock, mischievously flouting stylistic form every chance they get by way of sophomore long-player Bingo!, released on June 12th, 2026 via Bella Union (World) and Mothland (Canada/United States). On any given day, you can find La Sécurité sporting thrift-shopped goodies while smashing through their set in a fabled underground venue, on the rooftop of a tanning salon for a niche festival, or live on Riley & Coe (BBC 6). And for a true vintage musical onslaught, look no further than that VHS tape they did for Audiotree Live. Through and through, the Québec outfit indulge in a symbiotic hurrah of disheveled music, cloaked poetry and improv dancing, with movement as a main creative fuel. Since coming together in the Spring of 2022, they have been invited to perform noteworthy events such as SXSW (amongst NPR’s Best of SXSW 2025), End of the Road, The Great Escape, Reeperbahn, and Festival International de Jazz de Montréal, also touring alongside The Go! Team (US 2024) and The Rapture (UK/EU 2025), and sharing the stage with the likes of Automatic, Mauskovic Dance Band, and Death Valley Girls. “The bilingual post-punk jams the quintet dishes out are insanely catchy, with vocalist Éliane Viens’ carefree dance moves and multiple trips into the crowd making for a captivating frontperson.” (Consequence) Stay Safe!, the introductory studio album from La Sécurité, is manic yet surprisingly laid-back, painting unique sonic graffitis evoking a polymorphic reality. Bill Pearis from BrooklynVegan describes the long-player as “arty, danceable new-wave post-punk, [...] equal parts hooks and attitude with an enticing batch of party-friendly jams shouted in sneering Franglais”. Under the Radar’s Dom Gourlay quips: “La Sécurité take the best bits of post-punk—and by best bits, we mean Talking Heads, Devo, Kleenex and the B-52s—and turn it into something altogether new and exciting for the 21st Century.” For their first full-length, the collective turned to producer Samuel Gemme at Gamma Recording Studio, printing songs that are empowering, flush with urgency, but also denote a dash of melancholia. The album reached #2 on !Earshot, #33 on NACC, while being championed by BBC’s Iggy Pop and Marc Riley, the latter exclaiming: “Good lord that is excellent!” The following year, the flamboyant bunch offered Stay Safe! REMIXED (March 8th, 2024 via Mothland), a collection including remixes from Born at Midnite, The Mauskovic Dance Band, and Freak Heat Waves, giving listeners yet another fix of that “addictively saccharine angular pop” (The Line of Best Fit). La Sécurité’s followup Bingo! was produced by Félix Bélisle and Emmanuel Éthier (Corridor, Chocolat, Population II, etc.), and features idiosyncratic proto-pop anomalies that should please fans of Le Tigre, Snõõper, or The B-52s.
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CDSM
CSDM a.k.a. Celebrity Death Slot Machine is a “freakout post-punk group” (FLOOD Magazine) based in Atlanta, GA. Their stylish sonic onslaught is anchored around dancey rhythms, atypical synthesizer work, timely saxophone growls, as well as goth rock-esque melodies that serve to recount bizarre humor-laden tales from a derelict parallel universe. The death disco purveyors – featuring past and current members from Material Girls, Neighbor Lady, Mothers and Rose Hotel – recently unearthed their debut full-length album entitled Convertible Hearse. At the onset helmed by Ben Presley (vocals, guitar, bass, synthesizers, drums), Tyler Jundt (vocals, saxophone, synthesizers) and John Restivo Jr. (vocals, drums, percussion), CDSM is joined live by Jack Blauvelt (synthesizers, percussion, backing vocals), Drew Kirby (synthesizers, guitar, backing vocals) and Vinny Restivo (synthesizers, bass, percussion, backing vocals). Since forming in 2021, the band has toured North America and Europe, sharing the stage with likes of The KVB, Osees, Bodega, Sheer Mag, Soul Glo, Iceage, Civic, Model/Actriz, and Upchuck, while also taking part in events such as SXSW, Treefort Festival, Art Rock Festival, Hopscotch Festival, and Pop Montreal. About a set during M for Montreal, Consequence writes: “The packed in crowd caused so much heat the fire department showed up, but not before Atlanta, Georgia collective CDSM burned down the house in their own figurative fashion. A swarm of synthesizers, growling saxophone, and something that can only be described as gothic disco grooves were all part of the freakiest, wildest, most fascinating set I caught at M.” CDSM’s introductory EP, Hell Stairs (April 29th, 2022), was both glamorous and bleak, swanky and shabby, uplifting and crushing, described by the band as “hedonism clinking in your glass, change jingling in the pit of your chest”. It’s post-punk meets darkwave meets no wave, but it’s even more so, an invitation to dance away the pain, in the form of croon-esque laments, rumbling synths, swirling saxophone riffs and tight four-to-the-floor cadences. A perfect clair-obscure soundtrack for a night at the local neon noir casino. Post-Punk.com adds: “Sounding like a lost child of ZE Records and Stiff, Hell Stairs is infectious, slightly terrifying and a great romp through the hellfire and brimstone.” Atlanta’s hot new commodity followed with a slew of music videos – “GOGO” (May 11th, 2023), “Entertainment” (June 23rd, 2023), “DOM” (October 31st, 2023), and “SHADY” (April 23rd, 2024) – amidst a stretch that saw them bring their sweaty live set to the very best underground venues the United States, Canada and Europe have to offer. On May 23rd, 2025, CDSM unleashed their first long-player via boutique imprints Mothland and EXAG’ Records. Convertible Hearse is precisely the soundtrack you would expect to hear in such a vehicle. Unabashedly loud, danceable and decrepit, fun and freakish, it is the perfect road companion for driving around a very sexy topless van that may or may not have a nameless corpse riding in the back. Highly recommended for fans of Viagra Boys, The Voidz, Total Control, Duchess Says, or The KVB.