DEEPER 'Careful!'

The third album and Sub Pop debut by Chicago rock band DEEPER brings touches of The Cars, Television, and Low-era David Bowie to the band’s brand of catchy, energetic, guitar-driven rock. DEEPER is an integral part of the vibrant Chicago scene that includes bands like Dehd, Lala Lala, Horsegirl, and Lifeguard. You can’t get DEEPER if you’re standing still. That’s intentional, says the Chicago quartet’s Nic Gohl. “Does it feel good when you’re listening to this song? Does your body want to move with it?” These are the questions he asked himself as he and bandmates Shiraz Bhatti, Drew McBride, and Kevin Fairbairn were writing and recording Careful!, their third record and Sub Pop debut. “I wanted these to be interesting songs, but in a way where a two-year-old would vibe out to it,” Gohl adds. “It’s pop music, basically.” That “basically” qualifier is working pretty hard, as fans of 2020’s 'Auto-Pain' might suppose. On 'Careful!'', they’re not reimagining their sound so much as testing its limits. If you want to, you can hear echoes of David Bowie’s 'Low' in the snapping rhythm and gray-sky synths of “Tele,” but you can also hear a bit of 'Auto-Pain' in the nailed-in, stippling lines being spit out by Bhatti’s drum programming and McBride’s synthesizer.