Kevin Bronson on June 10th, 2016

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The first single from the forthcoming EP by L.A. trio the Active Set embraces the our long-held mantra, possibly first articulated by the famous newspaperman and flyer of kites Benjamin Franklin: “There will be plenty of time to sleep once you are dead.” In popular music, the ol’ you-can-sleep-when-you’re-dead attitude has lived on in so-so songs by the Cure and Bon Jovi, and an even worse one by Jason Michael Carroll. But the Active Set — singer-guitarist Matthew Stolarz, drummer Gabriel Grinta and bassist Alen Racedo — make theirs easy to like; it’s a solid indie-rock anthem with math-y guitar and a rumbling chorus in which Stolarz proclaims “Let’s go out tonight / We’ll sleep when we die.” Tangentially, the trio introduced the song as “a return to optimism, with GUITARS” (their emphasis). So if you are going out tonight, leave your synths and headdresses at home.

||| Stream: “Let’s Go Out Tonight”