B-Side Guys

After years cultivating chaos across multiple genres, Portland’s experimental punk outfit The Taxpayers delivers an unexpected emotional pivot with “Outline of Your Blood.” Nestled within their comeback album Circle Breaker, this track stands as a rare moment of unguarded vulnerability from a band typically more comfortable with righteous anger than raw sentiment.

The song’s existence feels almost confessional—band member Rob admitting these are “the most personal songs we’ve ever shared” and acknowledging that amid the album’s nihilistic punk offerings, tracks like “Outline of Your Blood” represent something nearly revolutionary for them: expressions of “love and hope.” This admission alone reframes the listening experience, asking us to consider what happens when artists known for their ferocity suddenly reveal their capacity for gentleness.

Musically, “Outline of Your Blood” demonstrates The Taxpayers’ ability to modulate intensity without sacrificing authenticity. Their instrumental approach here creates negative space that contrasts sharply with the band’s typically dense, chaotic compositions. This breathing room serves both sonic and thematic purposes, allowing emotional nuances to emerge that might otherwise be obscured in their more frenetic arrangements.

The track’s title itself suggests both intimacy and distance—the outline marking boundaries while blood represents connection and shared humanity. This duality mirrors the band’s creative journey through recent years, navigating between private trauma and public expression, between personal loss and continued artistic community.

What elevates “Outline of Your Blood” beyond mere stylistic experiment is its positioning within the larger narrative of Circle Breaker—an album born from experiences of “violent deaths of friends and family members” alongside “the births of our children.” This juxtaposition of destruction and creation, endings and beginnings, informs the emotional texture of the song, giving even its quieter moments an undercurrent of earned wisdom rather than naive optimism.

The decision to accompany this particular track with community-sourced footage feels particularly apt. By featuring fans, pets, and families, The Taxpayers subtly acknowledge how personal revelations can foster collective connection. After years spent challenging musical boundaries, they now appear equally interested in dissolving the barriers between performer and audience, between artistic statement and human communion.

For a band that emerged from Portland’s fiercely independent punk scene in 2007, embracing emotional vulnerability might represent their most boundary-defying act yet. “Outline of Your Blood” stands as testament to the band’s continued evolution, suggesting that after years spent raging against systems of power, The Taxpayers have discovered that tenderness itself can be revolutionary—perhaps the most radical act available in a world increasingly defined by its hardened edges.