punk staple SMIRK debuts “Going Off To Die”

Photo By Emily Vicario

Smirk mastermind Nick Vicario slows it down on his nihilistic single and album centerpoint, “Going Off To Die”. The moment Vicario’s vocal comes in, you can feel his dread of lost youth as a suburban reset looms around the corner. “‘Going Off to Die’ is about leaving Los Angeles in a sort of quiet defeat,” says Vicario. “It comes from a place of shame and deals with reckoning with who I was and accepting that leaving was the only way forward.”

Across Smirk’s upcoming album Speculative Fiction, out next Friday via Smoking Room, Vicario deals with a new twist on an age-old theme for punk rock: unrest in the suburbs. Instead this version of unrest deals with looking back on past indiscretions and dealing with their repercussions– disruption of the old life, settling into the new and the reflection that comes with it.  These thoughtful lyrics and themes, when paired with Vicario’s guitar pop confection, makes for a unique juxtaposition.