Excelling across both hard-rocking vigor and dreamier spaciousness, Fore is a rousing rock tour-de-force from Liquid Pennies. The Saint Petersburg, FL-based band succeed with a shift in their songwriting approach, deviating from their previous live-drums-first workflow into embracing a more expansive variety — now developed from “synthesizer arpeggiations, sequenced drums, and guitar tracked to a drum machine.”
The album also represents Liquid Pennies’ first vinyl release, with 180 gram availability in two styles: “Astro Pulse” (clear purple with pink/blue/black splatter) and “Electric Ice Melt” (clear blue with pink/purple/white splatter). A vinyl release show will take place on July 26th, at Bayboro in St. Petersburg, Florida, with a Summer and Fall 2025 tour planned as well to support the album.
Opening track “Tapered Scape” showcases the band’s knack for powerful tonal build-ups. Introspective, dreamy vocals traverse initially alongside pit-pattering rhythmic pulsations. Abstract lyricism alludes to themes of confinement and ensuing liberation, then sweltering into buzzing rock distortion as intensifying guitars and fervent percussion lead into a sating send-off. The ensuing “Ready Tide” melds brisk rhythms and spacey synth intrigue as vocals exude terms like “realize the rouse” and “reap the truth and look inside” — urging to look beyond the surface, and more into the tidal-like intricacies of life’s ebbs and flows.
A more vibrant, playful guitar presence emanates to start on “Sight Skewer,” where a chirpy radiance moves into heavier swells of guitar. Again, the artful lyricism impresses in its heady and abstract charm, invoking a shift from blurred vision into great clarity — reflected in the soaring “moving horizons from a point askew to focally refined” line. Soaring, wordless vocals combine with blistering guitar distortion as the final minute approaches, enthralling in its textured rock ardency.
Elsewhere, a delectable kraut-rock intrigue unveils on “Elliptic Triptych.” A hypnotic rhythm section and whispered vocal enticement venture seamlessly into blasts of hard-rock vigor; the tonal shifts between kraut-friendly head-nodding and ferociously anthemic passion make for a stylish, momentum-filled listening experience, while the lyrics suggest a battle between sincerity and misbelief: “Gave it your all but so did illusion.” A strong atmospheric entrancement shows here, and also on 11+-minute epic “Echolalia” — where more subdued beginnings launch into a feverish hard-rocking grandeur throughout much of its production, doing so with cohesive impact.
The subsequent “Further Ennui” feels like an apt comedown, led by chilly synths and an outdoor ambiance. Its absence of rhythm and vocals play climactically in the context of “The Bone,” which comes next and leads in directly from the preceding lushness. Former member Zoë Turtle bolsters its sound with magnetic violin work, weaving in with precision as thunderous guitar work immerses alongside. The emotively gripping track represents the first time Liquid Pennies has utilized a full string section, and they do so with fantastic form there and into the introspective title track finale. Fore is a comprehensively gripping rock success from Liquid Pennies.
