Outsider is the debut album from Minneapolis’ Bermuda Squares, an unequivocal lesson in delivering no-nonsense punk with melodic verve and exuberant sincerity.

Bermuda Squares feature a veritable roll call of the Minneapolis punk fraternity including members of Citric Dummies, Green/Blue, and Retainers.  And it will come as no surprise that the band call heartily upon this pedigree.  This is punk channelled through its core fundamentals, enriched by flourishes of carefully crafted invention – tightly honed two-minute eruptions that meld a Midwest heart with Southern California licks, a raw garage energy with contagiously layered pop harmonies.

The album’s driving force lies in its guitars – warmly fuzzed, they unfurl wave upon wave of buzzsaw riffs, fizzing with melody and rearing into fiery solos.  Meanwhile, the spiky vocals evoke wryly observed tales of everyday life’s fluctuating fortunes, from the rampaging Boring and Mortality to the more expansive Basement (Funbois) with its distinctive, almost country-tinged, twang.