Ears Wide Open: Chalk Talk

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Chalk Talk

Chalk Talk are an indie-rock quartet whose bittersweet, boisterous guitar blitz soundtracks the bittersweet, boisterous emotions of moving from one’s teenage years to early adulthood.

The foursome — Nina Tartibi, Katie Pruden, Fia Rose and Stella Singer — have been an on-again, off-again project ever since they formed in high school almost five years ago, and with good reason. Their academic pursuits have scattered the members across the country, leaving Chalk Talk’s music-making and touring to summer vacations and holiday breaks.

Chalk Talk released their debut album, “Just a Girl Band,” in 2019, and followed in the summer of 2022 with a second full-length, “Sometimes I Call You.” The latter album gets a vinyl release this week from Graveface Records.

This month, prior to the quartet’s holiday-break tour (which starts tonight in L.A.), Chalk Talk released the a single, “The Idiot.” Like their latest album produced by Austin Burns, “The Idiot” pivots from restrained to a roar in a heartbeat. Those mammoth swells of distortion are familiar to listeners who lived through the ’90s, as well as those who’ve dialed into this era’s grunge/noise-rock revival. It made for grand catharsis then, and now.

||| Stream: “The Idiot”

||| Live: Chalk Talk plays tonight at Genghis Cohen, joined by Operelly, Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit and Worthitpurchase. Tickets.

||| Also: Watch the videos for “Loveseat” and “Newspaper”