At this stage, I’m not sure even The Linda Lindas think that their age is the least interesting aspect of their identity!
On GOTTA GET OUT, the quartet from Los Angeles sound less like an exceptionally young punk group and more like just a really good f**king rock band which, in the moment, may be trying to decide what kind of band it wants to become.
Hey, I understand.
Intro
The LP is larger, more unusual, and more refined than their first two full-length LPs, Growing Up (2022) or No Obligation (2024). That level of refinement might… (well, ok, will!) inevitably offend a few fans who have always preferred the exciting roughness of the band’s early days.
But in my opinion, it’s absolutely an improvement. Hey, bands move on.
The title song makes its case right from the start: the use of synthesizers, a persistent bass line, and clearly defined guitar chords show that this is not just another set of two-minute punk tracks (as their initial EPs were). The music has a touch of early 2000s indie rock about it. The part talking about the need to escape a crowd of identical sounds could almost act as the album’s manifesto.
Then they continue throughout the rest of the record in refusing to stay in one place.
Highlights
“Burning Out” is excellent — it has a melodic quality, a sense of weariness, and sounds much louder than The Linda Lindas did a few years ago.
“Helado de Limón” retains the band’s goofy, exuberant side, though it is a slight, albeit quick, misstep in my view, before
“Blood on Our Hands” abruptly turns everything nasty: a short blast of politically furious hardcore, with lyrics like: “Give me a good reason that they’re taking away. Healthcare and food that people need day to day. And I don’t care about your wealth, I don’t care about your tax breaks. Nothing big or beautiful about a fascist state…”
“Break”, later in the record, does something similarly abrasive. Those eruptions are important because they stop GOTTA GET OUT from becoming simply a slick alternative-rock record.
Then there’s “Closer”, featuring Hayley Williams. On paper that’s almost suspiciously obvious. Paramore have probably been one of the clearest reference points for The Linda Lindas’ expanding sound. In practice, it works. Williams doesn’t hijack the song; she sounds as though she belongs in it. I love it, and it’s fantastic!
But my favorite stretch comes later.
“I Could Be Wrong” is one of those songs that demonstrates how much better they’ve become at letting a melody breathe rather than attacking it.
And then comes “Everybody Told Me”, which I think is the album’s standout. Kind of Cure-ish sounding, it’s moodier and less immediately punk, with a sense of unease and atmosphere that suggests a neat new direction for the band. (“Yeah, everybody told me. Nothing ever lasts. I could just stay here forever living in the past”).
It’s also probably one of their longest ever songs, at just over four and a half minutes long.
And then, at the end, comes “See You Next Time.”
It’s a gentle landing after an album full of sharp edges. Instead of ending with a scream, they end with a breath — a moment of clarity that reframes everything that came before. It doesn’t resolve the tension; it accepts it. The song feels like the band stepping outside that too…small room, looking back, and saying, “We’re still figuring it out. We’ll be back. We’re not done growing.”
It’s a closer that turns the album’s turbulence into something hopeful. I guess, a promise, not a conclusion?
The End
What makes GOTTA GET OUT interesting is that you can hear four musicians developing at different speeds and in different directions. And I mean that as praise.
A lot of bands spend years trying to eliminate their internal differences and arrive at a “sound.” The Linda Lindas’ differences are increasingly becoming their sound. One moment they want hardcore; the next they’re drawn towards enormous melodic alternative rock. Elsewhere there are new-wave textures, pop-punk, surfy guitars and indie rock.
It’s fun.
OK, it doesn’t always make for a perfectly coherent album.
At times GOTTA GET OUT feels more like a particularly good playlist than a record with a single aesthetic idea running through it.
But I’d much rather hear The Linda Lindas trying too many things than discovering a commercially successful formula and repeating it.
There is another tension here too. The production is unquestionably bigger and more expensive-sounding. Yet the record doesn’t feel as though somebody has sanded off the band’s peculiarities in pursuit of a larger audience. If anything, they’re using the bigger production to make those peculiarities even more pronounced.
The remarkable thing isn’t that a band who became famous when some of its members were children has “matured.” That was inevitable.
What’s impressive is that they haven’t matured into abject dullness. They’re getting better technically, writing more sophisticated songs and working with a much broader sonic palette, though retaining a slightly chaotic sensation.
If “Everybody Told Me”, “See You Next Time” and “I Could Be Wrong” indicate where they’re heading, while those blasts of hardcore remain part of the equation, their next album could be genuinely formidable.
And I’d put “GOTTA GET OUT” right near the top of anything they’ve recorded so far.
Chris Garrod, Friday, September 4, 2026
8.5/10
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