Lifeguard Releases “Ultra Violence.”

March 31, 2026

NEW LIFEGUARD 7” MAXI SINGLE “ULTRA VIOLENCE” / “APPETITE” OUT TODAY. GROUNDBREAKING CHICAGO TRIO ARE BACK

11 TRACKS IN 13 MINUTES

DEBUT LP RIPPED AND TORN OUT NOW

“The song of songs…stitching together the Swell Maps and Stef Petticoat with a sense of crooked, key-shifting purpose, confidently tumbling to the end of what might be [Lifeguard’s] best song yet.”

– Heathen Disco on “Appetite”

YEAR-END PRAISE FOR ‘RIPPED AND TORN’

PRI can’t remember the last time I was this excited over an emerging act.

– Paste (Best Debut Albums of 2025)

“Craftily melodic body-slam punk hooks.”

– Rolling Stone (Best Indie Rock Albums of 2025)

“Songwriting chops that go well beyond the band members’ young years”

– Aquarium Drunkard (Best Albums of 2025)

Out today, “Ultra Violence” / “Appetite” is the new maxi-single from Chicago trio Lifeguard. Recorded at the band’s rehearsal space/studio, the music continues the unstable ethos of last year’s much-loved debut album Ripped and Torn – alternating high-velocity punk-energies with surreal dub-inflected interludes.

The band has just completed a run of West Coast dates, including a sold-out show at LA’s Zebulon.

Lifeguard on “Ultra Violence” / “Appetite”:

Recorded in Lifeguard’s Stulogulo, newly equipped with actually terrifying faces and friendly heroine carpet, plugged straight into the 8-track machine with the aid of the Dub soldiers, dirty mixing pots, and Echoplexes, Lifeguard delivers these 11 tracks in under 15 minutes; 7 inches of LP-oriented fast and automatic music free from lingering, processing, over-thinking, or otherwise staving off release. The fully deterritorialized Ripped and Torn; the ripping and tearing of the band-aid.

This dub-abrasion Maxi-single is lithographed for the new generation of cylinders. A thin, round wax prism carries that 30-second torch of what shouldn’t be considered afterthoughts, rather deliberate bursts of scaffolding: ULTRA VIOLENCE and APPETITE.

Out now on Matador Records, Ripped and Torn is Lifeguard’s eagerly awaited debut album. The trio has now been making music together since they were in high school, nearly a quarter of their lives. Noisy and immediate, cryptic but heartfelt, they draw inspiration from punk, dub, power-pop, and experimental sounds, and bring them all together in explosive cacophony.

“ULTRA VIOLENCE” / “APPETITE”

TRACK LIST
Ultra Violence
Cuneiform
500K Foot Drum
Blatant Dub I
Manhunt I
Appetite
Manhunt II (Vogue A Go Go)
Blatant Dub II
Cuneiform II
Manhunt III
Steal Everything