Get Your Phantom Limbs Off My Neck

Customer “Floorboards”

It was only a matter of time before the sort of talky post-punk from the UK and Ireland that I’ve been documenting in my “narrators” playlist would start bubbling up in the United States and this debut single from the NYC band Customer is truly the best case scenario for such a thing. But then again, these guys are something of a ringer in that one of the members, Nicola Leel, is Scottish, so maybe it’s more like one of these types of bands just started in New York instead? In any case “Floorboards” is a remarkably confident debut that position Mallory Hawk as a charismatic presences within the first few seconds and just zips along to a shouty fist-pumper chorus that hinges on the provocative phrase “get your phantom limbs off my neck.” Hawk doesn’t waste time with narrative specifics and instead focuses her lyrical energy on evoking a terrible and recognizable feeling – you’re done with someone, you’ve moved on, but you’re still haunted by them having the nerve to be out there existing in the world.

Buy it from Bandcamp.