If you’re reading this, there’s a chance in the past year and a half you’ve passed by Brighton Music Hall, The Great Scott, or the countless other music venues that have closed their doors until further notice. The once flourishing music venues, now lay boarded up and empty. While the vacancy of these venues are physical representations of what Boston’s local music scene has lost, they’re also a symbol of hope. Many bands and artists across Boston have put on virtual shows or released albums and donated the proceeds to charities and funds across Boston to help support the underdogs of the Allston-Brighton community—the sound engineers, the stage crew, and other members within the community who are currently struggling. Birdwatching, a self-described nervous underdog pop band, is doing just that with their latest release. Their unique song titles and powerful, fast-paced guitar chords, make Birdwatching’s self-titled album a fantastic pop-punk renaissance piece for a great community cause.
The first thing you’ll notice about Birdwatching are the quirky song titles, but behind each title, details stories and anxieties surrounding death. “The most interesting question anyone’s ever asked me was what my greatest fear was,” guitarist Al Zaniboni explains, “and I said that my greatest fear is that one of my loved ones will die because of my actions… Either I make it, and I have to make a decision, or I do something to cause them to die. So, Andrea [Lead Vocals/Bass], and I really wanted to explore those fears for this record.” While this album was recorded throughout 2018 and finished in 2019, the feelings around the anxiety of being the cause of a loved one’s death ring true for many people as we continue to live in this pandemic hellscape.
Songs like “Behind The Hoodsie Cup” and “Softer Than Foreplay” immediately catch the eye, but the guitar hooks and the emotional lyrics will catch your ear, too. “Behind The Hoodsie Cup” is a particularly interesting song, telling a twisted story about how a 2am drive from Vermont to Boston could’ve ended. “This song, in particular, is about a time about 10 years ago, when I was in a different band. We had just played a show in Vermont and decided not to stay the night. So once everything ended, we drove through the night for 5 hours back to Massachusetts,” Al says. “I did all the driving, and we made it back fine and I even went to work the next day, but I had nightmares about it for weeks after thinking about all the things that could’ve gone wrong. That experience stayed with me, and so I wrote down these lyrics, and worked them into a song.”
The songs on Birdwatching bluntly face mortality in the most pop-punk way possible—with catchy power chords and a heavy drum beat. Combine that with Andrea Neuenfeldt and Al Zaniboni’s dynamic vocal duo, and this album is the perfect way to cope with what the past year and a half have thrown at us.
While Birdwatching isn’t planning on releasing music together after this release, they all agreed that as active members of the Boston DIY community, they wanted to do their part to help out their friends in need. “We’re all super close friends with the employees at these venues. Andrea has actually worked at O’Brien’s Pub and played at the Great Scott before the pandemic hit,” Al says. “We’re all in good shape, so we want to help our buds that aren’t as lucky.”
If there’s one thing that living through the pandemic has taught us, is that Boston doesn’t just have a music scene; We have a music community.
PRO TIP: Been in your feels lately, but still wanna rock out and pretend you’re at a basement house show? This is the album for you. Live (indoor) music is still a ways away, but that doesn’t mean you can’t party like you’re at a concert. Shut off all the lights in your living room, create a dance floor, grab your drink of choice, and rock the hell out to Birdwatching. Dust off that air guitar, grease the kink in your neck, and nod to the beat like your life depends on it—because this album is meant to be performed.
Listen below to Allston Pudding’s exclusive premiere of Birdwatching’s self-titled album on Bandcamp. Birdwatching will be released on Bandcamp on 5/7. All proceeds will go to the Allston-Brighton Mutual Aid and The Great Scott & O’Brien’s employee fund.