Dog Chocolate remind me of ‘that band’ everyone knew at college. The one who were all really good mates and knew how to put on a gig when everyone else was drinking cans in the graveyard – except now they’re grownups.
Their new long-awaited album So Inspired So Done In, recorded by Toby Burroughs and mastered by Sofia Lopes, is about change, time and artistic flair. We grow, create and move consistently through life. We try to focus on our burning epiphanies, just to get waylaid by the 9-5, or the beauty and monotony of ‘real’ life, love and loss. How we attempt to grip hold of our brilliantly shining ideas, just for them to filter through out fingers like sand in an hourglass – and then, they’re gone, almost as if they never existed and we’re left with the shell of a thought in our heads, staring at the bathroom wall and wondering what on earth we were thinking about in the first place.
Its everything the fourpiece have doodled about for the last seven years, thrown together in a loud hubbub of a musical record. Dog Chocolate, are back with their fourth album to tempt your earbuds, and tumble your senses.
First off – Dog Chocolate. I guess the name could be about the unnerving fact that chocolate (so delicious) is cyanide to a man’s best friend. Or is it a quote on the now-capitalist nature of our humanity, that we, like broken lunatics buy said fake cyanide for our lovable besties and feed it to them like fake masochists. Who knows, either way, what a great name for a band.
So Inspired So Done In is a convergence of the band’s seven-year break and all that happened in-between. Think Gang of Four, Sleaford Mods meets Deerhoof and Babyshambles. This album is an inventory of fast paced, short songs that fly all over the place and make you feel like you’re in the recording studio (which was actually a shed in Shropshire). It veers from punk to post-punk, shoegaze to indie-rock. They call it; ‘Pencil case Punk’. It’s a wild ride, all contained in this sixteen-track wonder.
Andrew, Matthew and Robert make up the vocals, percussion and guitar, while Johnathan takes on the drums. The quartet create a mass noise cacophony from start to finish. They guide us through their thoughts and ideas like fields of sheep to a sheepdog. It’s a whole lot of fun in an album.
We start off eating ‘Infinite Nuggets’, before realising its not those cardboard tasty morsels but more those golden nuggets of creativity that come into our lives and disappear before you can say ‘McDonalds adult Happy Meal’.
The third track, ‘Employee’ has a quintessentially 2026 sound. The music we’re all pausing to check out on reels as we scroll our social networks. You know what I mean, like Jason Williams doing his sensual dances with his dog in the background. ‘Employee’ is two monotonous notes which teleport us to those almost impossible days. The days that merge together. Us – the drones, no care in our work, ‘finding stockrooms where we can hideout’, trying to hold on to our humanity but forgetting where we put it. This track captured my ears, real good listening and catchy. I’ve been singing it all week while I clean dishes and smoke cigarettes pretending to be employed.
One of my favourite songs on the album is track six, ‘Potatoes in the Basement Bin’. It hit home as aren’t we all feeling like potatoes in the basement bin after a long, wet, dark winter, our little eyes watching from the darkness waiting to shoot up… has anyone planted any?
‘No Pavement Story’ is the only jazz-esq song I’ve ever liked. Again, its relatable, I’ve been there. Feeling a little wobbly, trying to make it along the country road ‘taking our chances with the branches’ to narrowly avoiding hurtling cars. Life, just the same, living on the edge of the mundane when everyone else seems to get there faster in their metal boxes. But it’s fun, it’s a memory, and probably worth writing a song about.
The final song on the album and title track, reminds us of all those things that we really want to get on with, but we can’t because we’re so absolutely knackered all the time. True dat’ sister.
A great album full of wholly relatable anecdotes, which has just as many great vibes blaring out of my laptop speakers as it would in a festival tent (almost!)
Check it out on now at Upset the Rhythm.
More Info: Instagram / Website / Bandcamp
Review By Jess Milner: Instagram / Website / Facebook / TikTok
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