Consumer Guide Album

Dream Wife: So When You Gonna . . . [Lucky Number, 2020]
Fronted by Iceland-born, California-raised, art school-finished Rakel Mjöli, this London-based all-female pop-punk trio picked their name before they'd ever played together and have a ways to go before matrimony per se is likely to be within their ken. Sex and romance, however, Mjöli has a bead on from the male-bonding pissoff "Sports!"--"Time is money/Never apologize/These are the rules"--to a finale called "After the Rain" where she both craves and rejects a tenderness that can only be provisional in a line of work that keeps her on the move. She knows sex and romance are easier to come by for a minor rock star, and is up for one or both from "Validation" to "U Do U" to "So When You Gonna . . ." But the crux here is called "Validation" because she knows that's the tough one without having figured out how to get it or why exactly she needs it so. A-