Makewar

***Formed out of the ashes of frontman Jose Prieto’s solo endeavor, Sad And French, MakeWar—completed by bassist Edwin Santacruz, and new drummer Alejandro Serritiello—have always worn their hearts on their sleeves. Heartbreak, despair, and alcohol have long been at the center of those struggles, and the songs themselves are a way to push through all of that. Whether it was 2015’s eponymous record—full band reinventions and re-recordings of Sad And French songs—2016’s first proper album, Developing A Theory Of Integrity, or 2019’s Fat Wreck debut Get It Together, MakeWar’s albums have all been intensely cathartic affairs that bristle with the promise and the terror of the human experience. MakeWar’s latest effort A Paradoxical Theory of Change describes a different approach to tackle the pitfalls in life. Instead of fighting or pushing against whatever it is you are feeling, absorb it, accept it, and let it be. That much is clear from the moment opener “Magic Worlds” kicks the record off. It begins almost tentatively, almost as if the song is giving the anxieties and traumas that inspired it room to breathe for a bit, to make themselves known before the band pushes back. When they do, it’s with a formidable statement of intent, of acceptance, of action through temporary inaction. In stark comparison to Get It Together—which was very much about a (pre-pandemic) world and society in decline and was commenting outwards on that— these 12 songs look inwards. And although Prieto might not need these songs to wrestle his demons in the same way, they’re as uncompromising and emotionally intense as ever.