For what seemed like an eternity, Baltimore band Pinkshift existed – at least online – as a scant collection of songs called the Saccharine EP, which trickled out as a group of singles over the course of more than a year during the pandemic, its name a likely reference to the band’s original moniker, Sugar Crisis. Standout tracks like ‘Rainwalk’ and ‘i’m gonna tell my therapist on you’ – the latter of which absolutely lives up to its stellar title – helped the band catch attention, and despite emerging to the wider world in one of the hardest times to launch a band, when shows resumed Pinkshift found themselves on the road supporting bands like PUP in huge, sold-out rooms, where the band threatened to steal the show with their amazing live performances, led by Ashrita Kumar.
Pinkshift’s show at Brighton Music Hall marks, according to Kumar, the largest number of people who’ve ever assembled for a Pinkshift headline gig, and even before their set begins they’re onstage with their two touring support acts, after the night is opened by Boston locals Yet to Bloom, themselves playing their biggest show. Second up, the mononymous Jhariah captivates the room with nothing but a piano, tablet, and wireless microphone – but for the finale of his set, he’s joined by all of Pinkshift to perform a song they recorded, as he tells it, over the span of 18 straight hours together in a Baltimore studio. Pinkshift also reappear at the conclusion of Jigsaw Youth’s set to join in the iconic woo-hoo’ing of Blur’s ‘Song 2’, after which Kumar gives vocalist and bassist Maria Alvarez a big hug before both bands retire backstage in preparation for Pinkshift’s own performance.
That set pulls from both Saccharine and their debut album Love Me Forever, announced earlier in 2022 and released in October. The album is proof that Pinkshift were the Baltimore area’s best-kept secret, and that Saccharine was anything but a one-off. Building on the foundation of hard-rock- and grunge-influenced riffs, and fully engaged vocals from Kumar, Love Me Forever is a huge statement piece: everything in the mix is ratcheted up but still distinct, owing in part to expert production from Will Yip, whose credits include work with Mannequin Pussy, Turnstile, and others who comprise some of punk’s new guard.
The set begins, appropriately enough, with ‘Toro’, named for the bullfighter’s call and one of the original five tracks from Saccharine, the pounding percussive intro from Myron Houngbedji like the ominous rancor of animal footsteps just around a corner. Soon after comes ‘i’m not crying you’re crying’ – this song bears a coincidental similarity to PUP’s ‘Totally Fine’, hinging on those two words in fact; but in Kumar’s narrative, they’re well aware of the thin veil of denial they’re hiding behind. ‘cherry’ is prefaced by Kumar asking the crowd if they ever feel that everything is alright and everything is doomed all at the same time – after the past few years, the answer is affirmed as resoundingly as one might expect. This sentiment is echoed on ‘the kids aren’t alright’ – “the world is ending all the time” Kumar says, noting that the generation tasked with confronting it is “numb or medicated”; this dissatisfaction with the diminishing returns of meds calls back to ‘therapist’ as well.
The singular most stunning moment of the night comes, perhaps ironically considering how thoroughly animated the entire band is when the three other members of the band take a pause and haul a Korg keyboard to center stage for Kumar. Its instrumental quietude may take people aback at first listen, but ‘in a breath’ trades the ripping, noisy riffs for tragic balladry, and its inclusion on Love Me Forever is a weighty demonstration of Kumar’s range as a writer and vocalist. In person it’s even more affecting – on stage it genuinely feels like Kumar goes someplace else in revisiting this moment of absolute vulnerability. The large audience, which moments before was moshing, goes completely silent – in the extended pauses between the final lines, not one sound can be heard, not from the crowd nor the bars nor any other source. Every single person within earshot is captivated, and Kumar looks harrowed when they conclude. They express a sincere gratitude toward the crowd, explaining how it’s difficult to bring that feeling out on stage; and to resounding cheers, guitarist Paul Vallejo raises Kumar’s arms up high in triumph as one might a boxer.
‘In a breath’ is a description of someone’s senses receding: the “I can’t feel you anymore” of its comedown is paralleled in other lyrics from the album, like the repetition of that phrase in ‘nothing (in my head)’ or the sleeplessness in the deceptively-slow opening line of ‘Cinderella’. Generally, Pinkshift’s music is a chronicle of the erosion that one can face both from interpersonal relationships as well as the state of the world, leaving one as uncomfortably raw as the heart that adorns the cover of their album. After Kumar’s solo performance, the band returns in full force – Vallejo and bassist Michael Stabekis rarely have more than one foot planted on the floor. Kumar leans out into the space between stage and crowd often, at times descending to the barricade and singing to the first couple of rows of fans, like during ‘BURN THE WITCH’, which holds one of the album’s most concise calls to action. “You’ve got two feet, why won’t you stand for something?” they call, attacking the passivity and inaction that permits cruelty to continue. On the flipside of this is ‘let me drown’, the album’s most thoroughly hardcore-punk moment, where by contrast Kumar’s antagonist is decidedly active, but unable to look at the consequences of their deeds.
The band plays nearly the entirety of their discography throughout the night, the dozen tracks of Love Me Forever plus everything from Saccharine save for ‘On Thin Ice’, which was on the printed setlist but cut for time as the band pushed the night to its absolute limit. Kumar calls on everyone to dance for the title track of Love Me Forever, with its chugging guitars that call back to the nascent days of post-2000 emo. The bellowed refrain of the eponymous line seems to come from a place so deep that it unquestionably earns its place as the title of this piece. Love Me Forever is a balancing act – the desire for connection, to fight against that receding tide; but simultaneously the need to escape the constraints that can cause those connections to swirl into a current in which one might very well drown.
Review and photos by Collin Heroux
