Photo by Boris Halas

Artist: Fcukers, the duo of vocalist Shanny Wise and DJ / producer Jackson Walker Lewis

Buzz: Getting the release date right changes the vibe considerably. Consider that of Ö, Fcukers’ debut album which arrived this past March. I’m not sure why that was the decided upon date. If memory serves correct, most of the northeast was still buried under snow and no amount of heat radiating from inside the club was going to melt away the damage that seasonal depression had done to your system at that point. The buzzy NYC electronic dance duo wasn’t slated to play this year’s Coachella either (they had already done so last year.) If anything, the spring tour that soon followed was a great way to perk up listeners’ optimism as the days got longer and temperatures rose.

It’s the dead heat of summertime where this album will thrive most on your rotation, however. Perhaps that’s because they planned to pop it off that way after a slow simmer after traveling throughout Europe’s festival scene during its peak — a natural second home for Shanny Wise and Jackson Walker Lewis that more astutely compliments their fully-charged LCD dance battery of sizzling electro-pop, techno in technicolor, and gravity-bobbling dub persuasion than the mere Brooklyn “indie sleaze” labeling which major press outlets have lazily stamped on them ever since they dropped their 2024 Baggy$$ EP — only to return to the big city and open up for, who else but Madonna.

Like the Queen of Pop’s latest dance music triumph, Ö also has that rare ability of being an obligatory endless play, no-skips-allowed kind-of-listen tailor made for the season where heightened dopamine, heart rates, and physical activity (be it workouts, dance nights, or taking their band name to heart) demand it. Across these 11 tracks, Fcukers pack a party invitational wherever you want it to be through hypnotic butterfly beats (produced by Kenneth Bloom) and sun-melted guitars with a high fashion sense of underlying Y2K-era dance-punk DNA racing through its pulse. By the time it reaches autumn in New York, something tells me that their appearance at the all-star Strokes show will be a well-deserved place earned among the most chic of indie influencers. Until then, it’s an easy summer getaway.

Sound: Dance-electrocuted pop where the subsequent synesthesia is neon white and the temperature in the room never dips below 90°F regardless of your geography.

Highlights: “Beatback”, “L.U.C.K.Y.”, and “Getaway” from their recently-released debut album, Ö

Fcukers’ Ö is available now on Ninja Tune.