Grief is a shadow looming in the background of Little Rope, the 11th studio album from riot-grrrl legends Sleater-Kinney. In the midst of recording, Carrie Brownstein lost her mother and stepfather in a car accident, a loss which is palpable in the dark corners of the album. With the band stripped back to founding duo Brownstein and Corin Tucker - long-time drummer Janet Weiss having exited in 2019 - Little Rope leans further into the mature sound that S-K been cultivating over the last decade without forgetting the sharp-edged delivery of their riotous early days.
This overarching sense of grief is reflected in the more sombre musical moments of the album, like the sparse, almost gothic verses of Hell that give way to the frenzied chorus. Later, this darkness manifests itself in the suffocating noise-rock of Six Mistakes, in which the droning guitars and funereal piano mirror the anxious self-doubt of the lyrics. On Dress Yourself, Tucker urges, “Get up girl and dress yourself / In clothes you love for a world you hate.” Whether picking yourself up from rock bottom or forcing yourself to fit into the confines of the modern world, it’s an all-too-relatable message.
