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New Music

New Music: Pile – “Leaning on a Wheel”

“Leaning on a Wheel,” the latest digital single from the Massachusetts punk quartet Pile’s upcoming fifth album A Hairshirt of Purpose, is about selfishness and inertia. Frontman Rick Maguire sings about having a baby “to save the marriage” and driving with his head down, pressed up against the wheel of the song title. Accordingly, “Leaning on a Wheel” begins quietly, with rolling toms and a twangy clean guitar figure, picking up momentum slowly as it travels. By the thrilling final third, Maguire and the band sound both listless and energized, like a car in neutral speeding downhill. Listen below.

A Hairshirt of Purpose is out 3/31 via Exploding in Sound.