Sports Team’s 3rd Studio LP is a “Carousel of 21st Century Sins” — Hedonistic Post-Punk For The Digitally Drowned
Boys These Days Produced by Matias Tellez (Girl In Red, CMAT, Gracie Abrams), Out February 28, 2025 On Bright Antenna Records / Distiller Records
Listen To New Single “I’m In Love (Subaru)” HERE
Today, UK band Sports Team announces Boys These Days, their third studio album out February 28 on Bright Antenna Records / Distiller Records and the band’s first new music in two years with new single “I’m In Love (Subaru)”.
"Harking back to the heady days of The Libertines" (DIY Mag) and currently in a heady young UK scene amongst peers like The Last Dinner Party and Fontaines DC, Sports Team’s rambunctious, electrifying live shows have amassed the group a massive, almost tribalistic following. Between moshing, a fan driven chart battle with a US megastar — their debut album hit #2 in the UK, narrowly losing (by 571 copies) to none other than Lady Gaga — memes via an infamous WhatsApp fan group, and chaotic aftershow hangs, the band has since conquered sold out venues like London’s O2 Forum and NYC’s Webster Hall, toured with Fontaines DC, The Last Dinner Party, and Wet Leg, and played festival stages at Glastonbury, SXSW, and more.
Today, the band also announced a string of fall dates across the UK — including a double header at London’s O2 Forum, full dates below.
A “carousel of 21st-century sins”, forthcoming record Boys These Days is both a critique and a celebration of our attention economy and the overstimulation of our digital world. Lining up and taking down a slew of vacant, 21st-century iconography with raucous yet glossy post-punk, Alex Rice, Oli Dewdney, Al Greenwood (one of the only young female drummers on the mainstream music scene), Rob Knaggs, Ben Mack, and Henry Young prove that this is the age of obsolescence: endless promise of a shiny new life, with the breakdown already built in.
Their first target: the car — and more specifically, the beloved Subaru Impreza — on lead single “I’m In Love (Subaru)”. Evoking memories of Bill Clinton’s sax-playing escapades on primetime TV in 1992 and inspired by Tears For Fears era synth pop, the track is a bright, dramatic turn for the band that artfully highlights the absurdity behind our era’s constant sales hype.
Watch “I’m In Love (Subaru)” directed by Dora Paphides (of The Last Dinner Party’s ‘My Lady Of Mercy’) HERE.
“The mood of the first verse and the chorus is quite sincere, a Hollywood-inspired, teenage love song,” explains guitarist and lyricist Rob Knaggs, “but by the time we get to the second verse, we’ve found the worm in the middle of that apple. All the symbols of teenage rebellion, the car itself, have all been co-opted into selling something that can’t actually be bought.”
While their first two, Top 3 records (the Mercury Prize-nominated Deep Down Happy (2020) and Gulp! (2022)) were composed for the stage, Boys These Days is far more maximalist. After playing their last run of shows two years ago, the band coalesced with producer Matias Tellez (Girl In Red, CMAT, Gracie Abrams) in his Norwegian studio for a long, dark, and productive winter. Extensive time in the studio allowed Sports Team to test out countless ideas — including sci-fi-tinged tracks, City Pop experiments and even a divisive electro-clash direction — until a unified vision emerged. Heavily inspired by Prefab Sprout, Roxy Music, and the pop art of 60’s Britain, the new record combines dissonant studio effects, big, 80s inspired horn sounds, and zippier melodies that all lend a bit of drama to Sports Team’s ever-rambunctious sound.
And where Sports Team has always been quintessentially British — sardonically poking fun at their memories of dull, suburban English life — the band now bravely takes on the overabundance of their whirlwind international travels and the barrage of imagery from their screens. From hyper-specific references to Bill Clinton or David Beckham’s kids, to more abstract, strange songs about feelings of cultural clash (“Bang Bang Bang”), wanting a family (“Maybe When We’re Thirty”), empty love spurned by proximity (“Moving Together”), and other Gen Z malaise, Sports Team is bringing back their sonic hedonism with youthful vengeance and incisive observations.
Pre-save Boys These Days here: https://ffm.to/BoysTheseDays
Tracklist
I'm In Love (Subaru)
Sensible
Boys These Days
Moving Together
Condensation
Planned Obsolescence
Head To Space
Bang Bang Bang
Bonnie
Maybe When We´re Thirty
Live Dates
14 November – New Century – Manchester
15 November – The Castle & Falcon – Birmingham
16 November – Arts Club – Liverpool
18 November – Foundry – Sheffield
19 November – SWG3 – Glasgow
20 November – Boiler Shop – Newcastle
22 November – Rescue Rooms – Nottingham
23 November – The Wardrobe – Leeds
24 November – The Trinity Centre – Bristol
25 November – O2 Forum Kentish Town – London
26 November – O2 Forum Kentish Town – London
July 24th - UK Tour Presale (10:00)
July 26th - UK Tour General on-sale (10:00)