Hailing from Tennessee, Cheap Time have been around in one incarnation or another since 2006. The nucleus of the band has always been Jeffrey Novak who writes and sings the songs as well as playing guitar and keyboards. The band began with Jemina Pearl and Nathan Vasquez from the band Be Your Own Pet rounding out the line up - theirs was a sound of a teen punk band with more attitude than musicianship, owing more than a little to early Redd Kross. By the time the band recorded their debut album the line up had changed completely and, in addition to improved musicianship, Novak brought in influences of 70’s glam and power pop bands like Sparks and The Quick. The band followed this up with more line up changes and a sophomore album, Fantastic Explanations (and Similar Situations), that was darker, moodier and more complex than it’s predecessor.

Despite the many line up changes, Cheap Time has always been a quintessential sum of its parts, an equal part being the low-fi bombast that they employ to scuzz-up their otherwise lightweight brand of simplified 1970’s glam punk that’s delivered with an expected amount of adolescent snottery with a strong sense of sing-songy cohesion, mostly dissected into two minute blasts of sound. Cheap Time are now back with their third and by far strongest record to date, Wallpaper Music. Watch the promo film here.

Recorded in Novak’s new home studio, Wallpaper Music is a perfect distillation of all the phases the band has effortlessly passed through to date. There are still the attitudinal punk moves and pop-damaged glam jams but this time around the come up with their most realized, cohesive record to date. Songs like “More Cigarettes” and “Another Time” are Aussie-esque punkers in an almost Saints-like vein. Tracks like “Underneath The Fruit Flies” show that Novak is finding a good medium here betwixt his punk tendencies and his desire to experiment. This latest installment should satisfy anyone who has been keeping track of this band’s trajectory and make them look forward to what might come next. Jeffrey Novak keeps challenging himself and the listener, which is how it should go.