We first found out about Detroit’s Jamaican Queens a few years back, after their debut album “Wormfood” fell into our inbox, and we in turn fell in love w the record (it ranked 2nd on our 2013 year end list!). Shortly after the record came out, their name appeared on Great Scott’s calendar, and we were fortunate enough to meet up with them a few weeks later when they came to town. We took the guys to one of our favorite spots, In Your Ear Records on Comm Ave., and filmed an episode of “Total Nuggets”.

Since then, we’ve been keeping a close eye on the band, and have continually been impressed by their captivating live shows, and their insane (usually pretty f’d up) music videos. Earlier this year we caught them at SXSW, and got a stiff dose of some new tracks from their latest album “Downers”, which dropped a few months later, and features some of the best album art work we’ve seen (cover design by Sweet Dick Will):

After diving into the album, it quickly became clear that this thing was a masterpiece. It was everything we loved about Wormfood, and then some. They’ve taken their sound to new heights, and beefed up their range by sprinkling in some different genres like the reggae infused “If You Really Loved Me”, and the industrial banger “Emo + Poor”. Lyrically, the album is just as bizarre and weird as we’ve come to expect from front man Ryan Spencer, yet the darkness that weighs on most verses, is often compliment by beauty, take “Love is Impossible” for instance:

Like a bird tricked by a pain of glass / I smashed through the window of your love

The band hit the road this summer in support of the record, including a stop in Boston for a show at The Sinclair. We kidnapped them in Providence the previous night, and kept them tied up in our basement until they played a few songs for us. Lucky for you, we filmed it all (not the kidnapping part)! Check out “Joe”, the first song from the session below:

and watch the entire set here:

PEACE OUT!