Victims of the New Math – “The Stories That You Weave”

If you have not heard of Victims of the New Math yet, this album is a pretty good place to start paying attention. “The Stories That You Weave” is a self-recorded, lo-fi indie rock album from Thomas Young, the one-man operation behind the project, and it covers more stylistic ground than you might expect from something made at home.

The range here is genuinely impressive. “You’re a Star” sounds like the kind of indie rock that got a lot of people into guitar music in the first place, while “Believe in Me” goes in a dreamier, softer direction. “It’s You That Wanted More” pulls from 60s garage rock in a way that does not sound like a history lesson, and “Time Flies” is my favorite. The album was mastered by Todd Tobias, and the production has real body to it without losing the warmth that lo-fi music lives and dies by.

Victims of the New Math is working with some big topics across these songs; fame, love, loss, trying to hold onto some optimism when the world keeps making that harder. None of it comes across as heavy-handed, and that balance is harder to pull off than it looks.

This is some of Victims of the New Math’s most confident work. If you enjoy it, go back and dig into his earlier releases because there is a lot there and it rewards the time. Follow Victims of the New Math wherever you stream, because he is clearly not slowing down.