photo by Michael Todd

The height of most Bogusman songs sounds a bit like their instruments and voices are fighting each other, or a bit like the rowdiest, most free-wheeling boys choir on earth.

Look to the Lincoln post-punk four-piece’s debut EP Bogus and you find a small handful songs that are at once complexly arranged punk jams, not afraid of classic rock and very given to frenzy. Chances are, as in the song “The Harvestmen,” that if things start in a simple place they won’t stay that way long. And if the reverse is true, the song will usually straighten out enough for a guitar solo to ooze out of some space in the noise — giving the band a sudden and unexpected melody to work around.

Now you might have seen them at Lincoln Exposed is in February at Duffy’s Tavern as our Jacob Zlomke did, but if you’ve caught the band in the last year, I’d say a Lincoln house show might actually be odds-on favorite for you having slammed your chin against your chest to a Bogusman song.

Nathan Luginbill, Andy Pederson, Lee Lohrberg and Jackson Trover have found their performance a home in a significant way in house venues like The Manticave, where the dirtiness of their music can operate in a room where the shouts and yelps that permeate the music might actually feel directed at you.

And, still, noise noted, when we at Hear Nebraska reviewed Bogusman’s EP earlier this year, Jacob was quick to point out their grace. In the vein of Lincoln post-punk forerunners like Dirty Talker, it’d be short-sighted to discount the arrangements at work here. None of the parts are so wild that they’re selfish.

You can see them on April 20 at The Bourbon, but right now they join us live in the studio on HNFM. With the song “Angler,” here is Bogusman.

Chance Solem-Pfeifer hosts Hear Nebraska FM with Jacob Zlomke every Monday from 8 to 10 p.m. Reach them at chancesp@hearnebraska.org.