Bark Your Head Off, Dog is the fourth studio album by American indie rock band Hop Along. It was self-produced, written over the course of 2016 and 2017, recorded at The Headroom in Philadelphia during 2017, and released on April 6, 2018.
The album was recorded at the Headroom, guitarist Joe Reinhart's home recording studio in Philadelphia. The album's cover artwork is an abstract landscape portrait painted by frontperson Frances Quinlan.
Composition
The sound on Bark Your Head Off, Dog has been described as "warmer", "more spacious" and more "vibrantly diverse" than its predecessor. The songwriting has been described as "more focused." Additionally, the album uses more "danceable" rhythms, and its opening track "How Simple" has been called "one of the band's poppiest moments". The album continues the band's usual blend of grunge, punk rock and power pop, and is also said to contain elements of progressive rock, folk rock, and lofi music. The album also makes use of unorthodox instruments such as harps, pizzicato, mandolins, fiddles, electric piano and vocoders.
Guitarist Joe Reinhart utilized "math emo" guitar techniques such as tapping, which drew comparisons to Algernon Cadwallader, his previous band. NPR wrote that the guitarist employed "twinkly, expressive guitar riffs that defined his defunct emo band Algernon Cadwallader and made that music feel unbridled and joyous." Some of the album's guitar rhythms have drawn comparisons to Paramore.
The lyrics on the album have been described as feeling "impressionistic."
Critical reception
Bark Your Head Off, Dog was met with "universal acclaim" by critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the release received an average score of 81 based on 14 reviews.
Music aggregator Album of the Year gave the release a 79 out of 100 score based on a critical consensus of 20 reviews, and, after aggregating a number of 2018's year-end best-albums lists, placed the album at #43 in the resultant ranking of the best 100 albums of the year.
Track listing
Charts
Personnel
- Frances Quinlan - vocals, guitar
- Mark Quinlan - drums
- Tyler Long - bass
- Joe Reinhart - guitar
References
External links
