* PREORDER * expected to arrive June

Highly recommended.

“It is more than past due to acknowledge Patois Counselors as one of America’s greatest bands. Protection Racket is the fourth full-length for the Charlotte-based group, who are still riding the wave from 2024, when they put out Limited Sphere. On Protection Racket, the quintet are locked in tight, but they keep the screws loose so that the Southern breeze can waft in and provide some essential lift. Patois Counselors write songs for the twilight, to be played as day slips into night and the possibilities remain boundless, even if only for one magical hour. But what gives Patois Counselors their power is the way they contrast their romantic inclinations with a discerning eye that harshly analyzes and defuses the nonstop stupidity of society in 2026.

“Sheer Radical” condemns the idiots we have granted dominion over millions of us—”What assigns the fundamental?/A whole unaccountable class/Behold Camelot for the vapid lot/Where money is the root of delight.” White’s lyrics are “liminal, though generally pointed,” which means he keeps his eye on the ball and that ball is a fast-moving lump of pure bullshit. “Cop City” opens up like Devo taking a swing at “Paint It Black” before White dismantles the suburban police state and its "application of soft hate.”

For a band that draws inspiration from the storied legends of post-punk (Pere Ubu, The Fall, Wire), Patois Counselors has consistently written some of the best songs about this terminally online era. “Iceberg Status” laments the “caps lock jockeys on repeat” who “can’t swipe right, can’t swipe left.”

“Generational Riffs” comes rushing in with Hüsker Dü-inspired guitar as White muses on the concepts of legacy and hype, small ambitions and supersized failures.
P.C has a well-established penchant for killer closers and “Outlaw Country” continues the streak as the band outlines the emptiness at the heart of the American dream.” - Erick Bradshaw