Voyeur is a New York City rock band that makes damaged guitar music in the general mode of Sonic Youth or Blonde Redhead. Personally, I think more bands should flex an overt Sonic Youth influence; there’s quite a bit there to be inspired by. Sure, Sonic Youth are, no doubt, one of the most influential guitar bands of the past half-century, and that influence ripples out in ways both seismic and subtle, but it’s not so common to hear a band tackle their legacy in such a direct way. Compared with, I don’t know, The Ramones, Sonic Youth’s massive influence is often cut rather than unadulterated.

But that is not so on Voyeur’s debut LP, The Burden of Desire, which flexes dual vocals—Jake Lazovick is a filmmaker who used to make music under the name Sitcom; Sharleen Chidiac is a choreographer and one of the founders of the East Williamsburg performance space Pageant—deft, breakbeat-aware drumming from Max Freedberg, and guitars that are not in standard tuning. It all makes for stirring listening. You can hear a band finding their voice in real time, digging into an inherited musical language and wrangling fresh ideas out of it.

The record was even recorded by Martin Bisi, who was behind the boards on some of Sonic Youth’s best records—namely, Bad Moon Rising and EVOL. Even so, if there is an era of Sonic Youth that feels the most relevant to our current cloud rock reality, it is probably the moody music the band made around the turn of the century, which seems like a touchpoint here, records like A Thousand Leaves and Murray Street. The Burden of Desire conjures a similar atmosphere. As the weather gets colder and the coats get thicker, it should be an accessory to any rocker’s musical outfit.