Kitten Forever’s Semi-Permanent is a musical party punch, the kind that’s incredibly potent for how sweet it smells. Their brand of fuzzy minimalist punk drives heavy bass cadences into the walls, floorboards, and everything, so much that the music seems to shake you until you dance. The power trio has worked their instruments so well (just bass, drums, and vocals) that I didn’t stop to consider there not being a guitar. The thick riffs are at their most speaker-rattling in “Fun Fact” and “Sour Cherries” where the bass seems to take on its own voice and character. Infusing riot grrl and punk and a little sprinkle of pop, Kitten Forever deliver a package that pays homage to the progenitors of punk when it was at it’s simplest and most pervasive. Kitten Forever comes out of Minneapolis, home to some of the first wildly distorted punk scenes, so it only seems right for this album to bear some of the same gritty tonality, most prominently in the vocals. With lyrics circling around love, femininity, and, of course, dancing and having a great time, it’s impossible to look at this album and not stare in the face the ever-growing population of women creating powerful punk and hardcore records. Dance on!
-Erin Cribbs