Wrapped in Plastic is a record that feels like it’s always on the edge of unraveling. Tense, taut, and unpredictable, this 9-track debut from Pry sounds like a post-punk psychedelic record filtered through the raw, blown-out energy of 90s Sub Pop. Jack Endino would be proud.
Established in 2023, the Brooklyn-based group consists of Amara Bush and Simeon Beardsley sharing vocal duties, Bush on bass and Beardsley playing nearly everything else, with explosive drumming by David Possehl, with a handful of assists on keys by Henry Smith. The songs on Wrapped in Plastic feel alive and constantly shifting.
“Heaven” is a standout, kicking into gear halfway through and finding a soaring, atmospheric groove before morphing again in its final stretch. It’s the kind of song that feels like it’s got four and a half ideas in its four and a half minutes, but it doesn’t feel disjointed or disorganized.
The record never fully settles into a pattern, opting instead for a constant unease. “Look Right at Me,” is a tension-filled spoken word piece, kind of an anxiety attack set to music. On the noisy and introspective “Greener,” Bush’s lead vocal rides the chaos of guitars and synths that sound like they’ve warped in the sun.
Pry doesn’t stick to the usual verse-chorus-verse structure, or when they do, it’s only for half the song. The result is a record that feels forward-looking: synths add an uneasy texture, vocals are layered and dreamlike, and every track seems ready to collapse.
“World Stopped Spinning” is a prime example, pairing hallucinatory, singsong lyrics with a crashing, chaotic climax. Mid-record highlight “Dayglow” glitches and stutters to life as a warm dreampop song about personal transformation (“I wanna be ignored / Til I can hold my head up / In the glimmer of the dayglow”).
Bush and Beardsley sing together on nearly every track, but there’s little interplay—it’s more like they’re merging into one voice, layered and harmonized, dreamy and off-kilter. On the title track, they push that approach to the limit: a cacophony of noice builds to a massive tension release, all buzzsaw guitars and cascading drums. It’s a cathartic moment, that ends abruptly, in an off-kilter lurch so common to the band’s sound.
On the closer, “Tether You”, Beardsley’s spoken word verse is the clearest his voice gets across the record, building into a towering climax about the impossibility of holding onto a fleeting perfect moment: “I’m only here for a minute / I was no one, nowhere ‘til now / I saw you floating in the distance / I could never tether you to the ground.”
There’s something distinctly Sonic Youth-y about this whole approach: a his-and-hers vocal blend that becomes a single entity, songs that refuse to sit still, and a sense of intensity that never lets up. Wrapped in Plastic is noisy, messy, and vital—a debut record that left me dazed in the same way that a blistering live show does.
