Brooklyn four-piece Bear Hands will release their sophomore album, Distraction, on February 18th via Cantora Records. In anticipation, the album is streaming in full below.

The 11-track effort was produced by the band’s guitarist Ted Feldman and mixed by James Brown (Foo Fighters, Nine Inch Nails). According to a press release, the album finds the band “stretching out from the charmingly scrappy indie-rock” of 2010’s Burning Bush Supper Club “into full-blown technicolor”, adding, “Distraction is a violently self-assured record which sees the quartet distilling their anxieties and pleasures alike into perfectly twisted pop nuggets. Hook-filled from top to bottom, but dynamic and filled with curveballs, it’s an invitingly idiosyncratic gem.”



By giving up some their raucous, more punk-inspired roots, Bear Hands have collectively grown as both songwriters and shapers of sounds. “Bone Digger” pairs Hall & Oates hooks with New Wave grooves, resulting in something that’s equal parts nostalgic and wholly fresh. Meanwhile, “Sleeping on the Floor” spins new layers into the garage-rock formula with little more than looped guitars and dense walls of harmonies. Perhaps most intriguing of all, however, is “Bad Friend”, which achieves an oddly satisfying sweet spot between lonesome alt-country and crunchy post-rock.

No matter the individual song’s components, though, an undying punk ethos still shines thanks to their insatiable sense of curiosity and utter creative fearlessness.