There are so many fantastic things to come out of Canada: A great flag, waffles, Drake, Arcade fire and PUP. Not to be confused with puppies that are soft, warm, fury and who make little noise, PUP are loud barking punk rock from Toronto.
Exploding out of Toronto are punk rockers PUP. Their loud, relentless and earnest anthems are undeniable proof of their punk rock pedigree.
A new band but longtime childhood friends on the punk block, PUP released their debut self-titled album late last year with Royal Mountain Records, shortly after signing with SideOneDummy Records as they released their LP on April 8th this year.
PUP were originally known as Topanga (everyone’s Boy Meets Girl crush). Their new name, said to be a savvy acronym for ‘Pathetic Use of Potential’, although I beg to differ that they should relate to that line of thinking. PUP formed by Zack Mykula, Nestor Chumak, Steve Sladkowski and Stefan Babcock might be fresh but that does not mean they are not furiously good and have quite a few achievements under their band belt already including, being named one of Canada’s up and coming bands by the Calgary Herald, as well as one of Stereogum’s top 40 bands of the year. Pup have also toured with similar Canadian band, Hollerado.
Recently Noisey announced that they believed that PUP’s debut album was ‘A perfect ten’ alongside NME who described them as ‘Effortlessly cool, charmingly nerdy and wholly brilliant.’, a line that I wish I thought of first.
Enough of the Wikipedia entry stuff… Despite their early showings of success, PUP are not that fussed on this. Their Bandcamp bio states: ‘We’re called PUP. We’re 4 dudes from Toronto. We play loud music. You’ll like it. Or maybe you won’t. Listen and love it / hate it / whatever…’ which, to me screams authentic punk at its humblest.
For now, PUP are set to play local shows around their waffle-loving-hood. Steve from PUP discusses, ‘The more time we spend on the road, the larger my collection of band tees grows. This is great because I can support bands I love and because I don’t have to do laundry as often.”
Punk life. Happy listening!
FIND OUT MORE ON
▲ FACEBOOK ▲ WEBSITE ▲ BANDCAMP ▲ TWITTER
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