Seattle indie-rock trio Tether the Star released “Degeneration” on June 5th, and the origin story behind it is as direct as the song itself. Vocalist, guitarist, and visual artist Maëry Lanahan wrote it out of a conversation with her teenage daughter about how marketing and social media systematically erode self-worth in young women – a subject Lanahan recognized from her own adolescence. The song confronts the industries that profit from manufactured insecurity, turning fear into content and flaws into product opportunities. Produced by Taylor James Carroll at Bear Creek Studios and released on Not My Fault Records, the track is the latest from a band built around the intersection of songwriting, experimental texture, and cinematic arrangement. Their album release show is booked for September 6th at The Sunset Tavern in Seattle.
Musically, this is one of those golden examples of someone recreating a style of song that was once popular but successfully imprinting their own identity onto it – effectively making something fresh. Structure-wise, it’s a very 80s song; the chords themselves and the songwriting DNA, if you stripped it back and played it acoustically, would land squarely in that decade. But the textures and the performance itself are what make it uniquely Tether the Star’s. The synth work from Connor Hall and the production choices push it into a contemporary space without erasing the bones of where it came from, and Lanahan’s vocal delivery carries the emotional whiplash the lyrics demand – the verses are anxious and pulled in multiple directions, the chorus flipping from compliance to outright defiance on the same phrase. I believe that’s what they set out to do, and they really did achieve it.
The lyrical device at the center of the song – “make me” shifting from a plea to a dare within the same breath – is the kind of writing that earns the production around it. Tether the Star has a full album on the way, and if “Degeneration” is the temperature check, it suggests a band with both something to say and the craft to say it memorably.
