By Leslie Banks
Rock ’n’ roll has always had a drinking problem. Hell, half its mythology was built on whiskey bottles, broken barstools, and the kind of decisions that sound fantastic at midnight and look like a police report by breakfast. From the swaggering excesses of the Stones to the beer-soaked lunacy of the Replacements, alcohol has been rock’s favorite accomplice, excuse, and occasional executioner. But Pittsburgh-area bruisers Noble Hops have decided to flip the bottle upside down and see what ugly little truths come spilling out.
Their new single, “Thinkin’ (‘Bout Drinkin’),” arriving October 10th, isn’t some fist-pumping celebration of Friday-night stupidity. It’s the morning after, the afternoon before, and the vicious little cycle that connects them. It’s a rock song about drinking that has the audacity to admit drinking sometimes sucks.
And there’s something wonderfully subversive about that.
Frontman Utah Burgess, who originally wrote the music nearly twenty years ago and collaborated on the lyrics with former B.U.M. bandmate Marty Roppolo, doesn’t bother dressing up the situation in metaphorical perfume. The opening image is a man drinking straight from the bottle because even the simple civilization of a glass seems like too much trouble. He’s already on his way to oblivion, and everybody knows it except, apparently, him.
Then comes the chorus, a gloriously circular piece of alcoholic logic:
“Now I’m thinkin’, ’bout drinkin’ / And I’m drinkin’, to keep from thinkin’.”
There it is. The whole damn tragedy in two lines.
Forget your twelve-step lectures and preachy television specials. That little lyrical merry-go-round tells you everything about the machinery of self-destruction. The bottle becomes both the problem and the proposed solution, a cruel practical joke that stops being funny somewhere between the third drink and the shattered relationship.
What makes “Thinkin’ (‘Bout Drinkin’)” particularly interesting is the contradiction at its center. Noble Hops, a band named after one of beer’s essential ingredients, is offering a song about the dangers lurking inside the very substance its identity cheerfully celebrates. That’s rock ’n’ roll irony with teeth.
Musically, the single represents the band’s harder-rock direction. Tony Villella’s electric guitar work, Burgess’s rhythm guitar, Johnny “Sleeves” Costa’s bass, and Brad Hurlburt’s drums provide the instrumental foundation for a story that demands something more confrontational than a polite acoustic confession. The material calls for grit rather than polish, aggression rather than sentimentality.
And Burgess knows the difference between singing about drinking and glorifying it. His narrator isn’t some glamorous outlaw staggering triumphantly toward another round. He’s a frightened, lonely bastard watching his life dissolve and wondering whether his true colors are uglier than he ever imagined.
The woman leaves. Sobriety arrives too late. The damage remains.
Released on World Mental Health Day, the song also raises a question rock music has spent decades avoiding: What happens when the party is actually somebody’s attempt to outrun despair?
Noble Hops doesn’t offer a tidy answer. Thank God.
Because great rock songs aren’t supposed to solve your problems. They’re supposed to grab you by the collar, shove you toward the mirror, and make you confront whatever’s staring back.
“Thinkin’ (‘Bout Drinkin’)” isn’t buying the next round.
It’s handing you the bill.
And brother, it’s a hell of a lot bigger than you thought.