B-Side Guys

The song opens with eleven stochastic snare hits, which is either a compositional choice or a warning shot, and given where “Down with the Setting Sun” goes from there, probably both. Seattle’s Jupe Jupe have been drawing lines back to Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen for years, but this fourth single from King of Sorrows is the most direct they’ve made that connection, a darkwave post-punk track that treats sunset as a false resolution rather than a natural endpoint.

The central argument is in the chorus: “hurt doesn’t always run / down with the setting sun.” The close of day is the oldest metaphor for closure, and Jupe Jupe rejects it flatly. The careless things stay. The curse keeps dripping. The wars you’ve won in your head don’t stop just because the light changed outside. My Young’s baritone against Bryan Manzo’s interweaving guitar and bass creates a forward momentum that feels trapped rather than driven, the “tribal drums” underneath pressing against a story that can’t find its exit.

“You’re a bird of prey” lands at the end without a full stop, which suits a song about things that don’t conclude. The relationship being described is one where people need each other and use each other in the same motion, and the production mirrors that: seductive enough to keep you in it, dark enough that you’re not entirely sure you should be.

Eight albums deep, Jupe Jupe are still refining what they do rather than repeating it. King of Sorrows, from what “Down with the Setting Sun” suggests, is the refinement at its sharpest.