Ah to be alive in this day and age. Plagued with all the day to day worries of jobs, friendships, romantic connections, rent, bills, keeping up with the Joneses… but we’ve got a bonus stress on our hands, a final boss if you will – the world is ending. Okay, maybe there’s a touch of hyperbole there, but it really does feel like that sometimes. It’s hard not to feel hopeless when you’ve inherited the environmental mistakes of the past generations and being asked to use paper straws to save the turtles while corporations continue to throw fuel onto the fire of an already burning planet. If you’re wondering what’s got us so hot under the collar (aside from global warming that is), then let us put you onto proFESSional and their brand new single ‘TELEVISION’.
This London-based band have infused their gritty post-punk style with a sense of fear and anxiety that many of us experience when we turn on the TV. Recently, the news was awash with scenes from Hurricane Milton, or perhaps it was the floods in Nepal that caught your attention, or how about the massive oil spill in the Peruvian Amazon? As the band themselves confess, “I saw the news and now I’m scared / To leave the house / I should have watched some / David Attenborough instead.” The intensity by which vocalist Mani delivers his seemingly instant reactions to the latest media fear-mongering holds your attention through the track. His bandmates also put their full weight behind each element, from the finger-tip searing riffs of Rob Hennebry and Paul Fifield to the neck-breaking bass of Marco Gaspari to the crashing drums of Jonny Brister. The result is a truly gripping piece of modernised punk that we already can’t get enough of.
‘TELEVISION’ is also joined by a riotous music video in which the band’s fierce performance switches between in-studio shots to a static television screen; their two-person audience is simply overcome by the track, wrestling over the TV. Brownie points if you spot David Attenborough hitching a ride of a humpback whale.
If we hadn’t already given you enough reasons to go check out proFESSional right away, here’s some additional insight into the new single from Mani: “Television lays bare the profound impact of media, and the existential dread channeled directly into our homes. It’s a commentary on the overwhelming, ridiculously disturbing overload of the information we all consume on a daily basis”
You can also find ‘TELEVISION’ in our Indie Rockers playlist.
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