Artist: Kareem Rahma’s Tiny Gun, the five-piece of vocalist Kareem Rahma, guitarists Tyler McCauley and Joe Tirabassi, drummer Dale Eisinger, and bassist Matt Morello

Location: Brooklyn, NY

Buzz: Somewhere along the way, we started to lose the notion of a band’s surroundings informing their sound. Blame the Internet and the way it has erased geographic limitations for that, which to be fair, in some ways has created a net positive in having some kids in the Midwest becoming breakouts in the shoegaze scene while one of the more interesting new alternative country bands comes out of Philly. But when you listen to a rock band from New York City, you sure as fuck want them to sound like a rock band from New York City. Kareem Rahma’s Tiny Gun knows it.

Perhaps it’s because its five members collect themselves from various stages of their scene’s millennial history: drummer Dale Eisinger was the rhythmic tour de force as one half of the industrial noise duo YVETTE, guitarist Tyler McCauley did what the Dare does now in the shadow of the DFA specter to a more finessed effect with his band, Motion Studies, Joe Tirabassi kept DIY indie rock true as the six-stringer of Darlings, Matt Morello was the godmode bass particle of noise rockers Mr. Dream, and finally, vocalist Kareem Rahma remains that dude who has his talents in everything, from content creation to comedy with his respective shows, Subway Takes and Keep the Meter Running.

Their debut EP, No Worries If Not, has plenty of sardonic jabs in it, but its reverence to the city’s rock and post-punk vanguard is every part of the bit in the most earnest way as well. Imagine a place where those hedonistic massive nights of lored loft parties, dive bars and DIY spaces soundtracked by Television, LCD Soundsystem, and the Hold Steady coexisted in the same timeline, and the capitalistic death grip of Vice never killed their spirit. Something about them feels familiar without sounding intentionally reductive, yet unassuming that it’ll somehow save the scene. Today’s culture may have passed it by anyhow despite Gen-Z’s half-hearted attempt to resurrect something they never lived through back to life. Thank god for that, because rock music like this that’s got no stake in the game is genuinely cooler for it.

Sound: *With a tiny gun pointed at the writer’s head* Definitely not the Strokes.

Recommended: “Baby I Could Never Win”, “No Worries If Not”, and “Time” from their newly-released debut EP, No Worries If Not

Kareem Rahma’s Tiny Gun No Worries If Not is available now.