★★★★★

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unpeople are arguably one of the biggest up-and-coming bands in the industry right now, and this album might push them further to break through that roof. Currently on tour with Don Broco, followed by Royal Blood, unpeople have nearly sold out their headline UK tour for early 2027. They’ll continue into Europe straight after, where tickets are already selling out.

This was probably one of the hardest reviews to start because there is so much to talk about and dissect that we wanted to get it exactly right. We could say, “this debut album is five out of five stars; go listen to it and don’t argue with us”, which we almost want to say. But we’re here to tell you exactly why you shouldn’t hesitate to listen to the album in its entirety on Friday 9th October.

Self produced by the band and mixed by Machine, we were incredibly privileged to hear this album before its release.

We’ve already had a taster over the last few months, even years, of what to expect on this album with the single releases of ‘friends’, ‘clouds’, ‘waste’, ‘the garden’ and ‘blueprints’ - ‘swallow’ has been added to their live setlist a few times but not yet released as a recorded track. These single releases set incredibly high expectations for this album, and we are thrilled that we were kindly gifted the first listen before release. We can confirm, our expectations were met and exceeded.

They are holding up a mirror to ourselves for this album. It discusses mental health, anxiety, and feeling overwhelmed, but also overcoming that and discovering that life is precious and we should be grateful. When you hear that an album discusses topics like this, you tend to think, “oh god, not another one”, or “that’s going to make me want to cringe.”

unpeople achieve the non-cringe so incredibly well through tongue-in cheek lyrics and silly billy guitar and bass riffs. You almost forget they’re even hitting these hard topics until you start screaming, “I never thought I’d never want to die”, which hits so hard. They want to say to you that life does in fact get better, just hold on tight. It’s got to get bad before it gets good.

To sum up this entire album before we dive in, we’re suckers for a groovy bass, hard-hitting drums and half-time. We can guarantee this album covers all of that from top to bottom.

For this review, we’re only going to review the newly released songs that haven’t yet been released as singles. Based on unpeople’s social media, we’re going to take a guess and say the next single release from this album is ‘bottle it.’ The simplest way to describe this song is that it makes me want to girly-pop dance, but also open so many circle pits. “Why isn’t any of it working, beating your head against the wall.”

‘swallow’ has been played live a couple of times, but it was great to hear the recorded version for the first time. It starts with Jake’s short spoken word, which feels Enter Shikari-influenced. “I’m telling you as a friend, not all that glitters is gold. You don’t have to believe us.” They’re quite literally telling you to stop being mean to people and swallow all the hurtful words. There’s a tendency to edit out imperfections in modern music, and the cough before the breakdown adds back in that human element.

My personal favourite song on this entire album - and it was difficult to narrow down - ‘haunted’. In ‘the garden’, Emma adds a fun motorbike rev-sounding bass, and you can tell whenever she plays it live that she loves her addition to the song. The exact same sound is in ‘haunted’. “Every option is exhausting.” The breakdown of harmonies in the bridge is biblical. “Watch me burn just to feel again.”

‘look up’ has more Emma vocals with insane drums from Richard. “So good at making my own bad luck.” This entire album is filled with such a good drum and bass from the two of them. I’m lowkey obsessed. The ending gives a triplet feel, shifting into a perceived metric modulation. This was a very high contender for top favourite track.

‘kangareuben’ was a very exciting listen for us, especially previous fans of Press To Meco. We can hear references to ‘Rusty Nails’ and ‘Another Day’ in this song. “I know you do it all for you.” “You don’t know what they’re going through, only if they think the same as you.” Jakes screams for this track are absolutely incredible. This has a head-banging ending with another psycho reference sound from ‘smother’ that ends with slowed down tempo. The “dance right round the issue” chant is silly and we want more of that.

Finally, ending with ‘as you were’. I didn’t know how to describe this song other that saying, “Christmas”. It sounds very festive, but starts with a jungle-esque drum beat, which is wild. “Oh, what a waste of time.” The four-part harmony fully comes through with the backing vocals over Jake. The clean bridge with Luke singing is also very Press to Meco-esque. “No, don’t go before me. Time passed by so swiftly.” Luke, Emma & Richard’s vocals softly over Jake is a gorgeous way to end the album. They’ve really made the end song sound like a grand finale with the acapella finish and crescendo instrumental.

We’ve already listened to this album in its entirety at least four times in the last 48 hours, and we’re super excited to hear these new tracks live over the next coming months. We’ll be catching unpeople supporting Royal Blood this November before attending their London headline show in January 2027.

we are unpeople.

you are unpeople.

we are all unpeople.

‘we are unpeople’ debut album release

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