Clutter banish cynicism with the aptly named Sugar Rush

So when someone tells you about a new band doing interesting things in a grungy, punk-pop vein, it can be all too easy to roll your eyes and assume that it's all been done before, and better. But sometimes curiosity wins out, you press play, and a song like “GirlVsHeart” hits you full in the face with crashing drums and gleefully thrashing guitar. Instantly you’re hooked and lock into a record that turns out to be a stomping joyride of youthful angst and, along the way, offers up a few surprises.

This is Sugar Rush, the debut album by Swedish twenty-somethings Clutter who emerged from the Stockholm underground back in 2024 after signing with DIY rock label PNKSLM. Made up of singers Hilda Ander and Emma French, who alternate between guitar and bass, plus guitarist Ove Jerndal and drummer Ville Scott, Clutter's songs are anthems to the agony and ecstasy of growing up, or frankly just existing, and ricochet around the room with barely contained energy.

In that sense, the title of the album is perfectly apt. Taking their cues from a short list of classic indie touchstones, Clutter reach back to ’90s grunge bands such as early Veruca Salt and Sonic Youth at their most concise and approachable, add some riot grrrl grit, then show that they can write songs just as brutally catchy, and invigorating too.

A track like “Hello Kitty” indicates Clutter can already do this better than many of their contemporaries. Resting on a dark undertow of fuzzed-up guitar, it’s an instant play-once-and-whack-on-repeat song, and it’s not alone. “Grease Baby” is part ’60s ba-ba-ba beat pop, roughed up and spat out with a hard-to-resist enthusiasm, while the manic “Robot” is a visceral knockout that grabs for a Ramones-like dumb-but-clever simplicity.

But Sugar Rush isn't only fast-paced, cacophonous, roughly melodic chaos. Clutter can switch things up too. Case in point: the weirdly woozy distortion and whispered, sing-song vocals of “I Wish I Could Keep It Together”, a co-write with Sixten Book of Cockhouse, complete with barely in-tune whistling. Somehow, it all hangs together and shows real promise beyond the expected.

And that could really be Clutter in a nutshell: steamrollering doubts with a natural ability to create potently infectious songs that laugh right in the faces of the heard-it-all-befores. After all, this is a band that boasts its own theme song, "C.L.U.T.T.E.R", a glam-punk homage to life on the road that comes complete with a rock club-ready, shout-along refrain.

Sugar Rush sounds like the beginning of something very good indeed.