Jeff Rosenstock releases 4 new songs ft. Laura Stevenson & Skatune Network

Manny Sanchez

Not only did Jeff Rosenstock release the excellent new album NO DREAM on Polyvinyl this year, but he's also stayed busy with a lot of other things, including cool livestreams, contributing cool covers to cool compilations, taking part in Polyvinyl's unique Exquisite Corpse project, and more. Now, he's launched a new Bandcamp album called 2020 DUMP, which currently has four songs he's made at home during the pandemic and which he'll keep adding to.

Laura Stevenson sang on three of the new songs ("Dept of Finance," "Collapse!" and "Done Done Done!"), and Jeremy Hunter (Skatune Network, JER, We Are The Union) played horns on "Collapse!" and "ACAB," both of which find Jeff revisiting his ska roots. "Dept of Finance" finds him in acoustic singer/songwriter mode, while "Done Done Done" recalls the indie-punk of his recent solo albums. They're all great, and they all sound lyrically inspired by what's been going on around us this year. Jeff writes:

Yoooooo I have been recording stuff at home and I'm going to continue to post it here. Hope ya like it.

Please do not feel obliged to spend money on this music. I do not intend for it to be monetized. Any money that comes in through Bandcamp for these songs will be donated to charitable causes, but less money will get taken out if you just do that directly on your own - which I encourage you to do if you can afford it. And if not, it's cool.

[...] For Elijah McClain, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Andres Guardado, Tamir Rice, Oluwatoyin Salau, for the countless victims of violence everywhere.

As this is being released the air in California is hazardous to breathe, the current president has repeatedly used Nazi imagery for his re-election campaign and the police are still shooting people because of the color of their skin with no signs of slowing down, despite a worldwide outcry for peace. In fact they are fighting those cries with chemical weapons deemed too brutal for conventional warfare.

We also spoke to Jeff earlier this year about the act of surprise-releasing music, pop punk, the music that inspired NO DREAM, and more. You can read that here.

Earlier this month, Laura Stevenson reissued her 2011 album Sit Resist, including a bonus LP with Jeff Rosenstock-produced pre-production demos and liner notes by Jeff, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus.

Jeremy Hunter recently released the first song for their new JER project, "Breaking News! Local Punk Denies Existence of Systematic Racism," on Bad Time Records, Asian Man Records, and Ska Punk Daily's new Ska Against Racism benefit compilation.