Los Angeles-based dance punks PUREST FORM — Story Beeson (vocals), Madi Woodward (guitar, programming) and Riley Oikawa-Dahlson (bass) — draws on the individual members’ respective backgrounds in hardcore punk, and their shared love of industrial and techno, blending the intensely heavy with the playful and sensual.
Within two years, the Los Angeles-based trio have quickly developed a reputation for a must-see, chaotic live show while landing opening slots for Boy Harsher, Chat Pile, King Woman, Sextile and a growing list of others. 2024’s self-titled EP was released to praise from Stereogum, dublab, FLAUNT, Consequence, BrooklynVegan, Revolver, Treble, New Noise and more.
Building upon a growing profile, the trio signed to Dais Records, who will be releasing their highly-anticipated third EP, the six-song RESISTANCE. The EP is reportedly an anarchist assault on the system, fueled by their collective anger amidst our late-stage capitalist dystopia and a year of bitter, nonstop trauma over the past year in Los Angeles, including the wildfires and ICE raids. “Resistance, less of an idea, more of an absolute action that has to be taken,” Story Beeson asserts.
RESISTANCE EP reportedly builds upon their self-titled EP with the forthcoming EP’s material reportedly being more agile and charged up with structural jumps and hard left turns, confronting sonic and societal constructs. Nodding at death metal and acid house, the material is built with serrated guitar riffs, fractured breakbeats, forceful bass lines and body-quaking feedback beneath Beeson’s urgent, feral howls. “We decided to just take it to the next level with this one,” PUREST FORM’s Madi Woodward says. “It’s like a unification of all the music that we love and feel. And it makes sense to us. If it sounds good, we don’t care where it comes from.”
Woodward continues, “We set out to do something and say something. It did feel cathartic.”Beeson adds, “The nature and actions of our country are overwhelming, I can’t get away from the feeling of ‘what can we do to resist this at all costs?’ We have very radical fantasies across the board, making music that isn’t talking about what’s happening right now just feels unimportant to us. We are willing to sacrifice whatever to make music that is honest. It’s both important and fun to have a project where it’s just like a complete fuck you. And also a complete desire to unify.”
The EP was recorded sporadically throughout the course of last year, beginning while Beeson had been evacuated from her home. Sketches started on the computer, before open-ended sessions with their longtime collaborator and producer, Andrew Oswald. “A helpful and needed distraction during a pretty bleak year for the world. It became the one thing that felt good to us,” says Riley Oikawa-Dahlson. “We explore some dark headspaces, but it’s also dance music.”
The EP’s latest single, live show staple and EP opening track “ANIMAL” is a bruising and primal, mosh pit friendly ripper anchored around serrated guitars, relentless thump beneath Story Beeson’s feral howls. The song simultaneously evokes the unending horror, despair and rage of our moment while seemingly channeling Ministry and Astro Creep-era White Zombie.
Directed by the band’s Story Beeson, the accompanying video is a righteous condemnation of constant surveillance world while capturing the band’s furious performance. “The video takes on the horror of surveillance. While using a lot of throwback technology, mostly to pay homage to its influence – Peter Christopherson’s video for Ministry’s ‘Over The Shoulder’, it very much intends to communicate how more modern technology is being used for violence against our communities and humanity as a whole,” Beeson explains. “It fits with the concept of ‘ANIMAL’: whether the nature is sexual or simply a desire to exist, we deserve to have freedom and we must take that freedom back.”