It was the night before the inauguration and, somewhere in the distance, the Eaton and Palisades fires continued to burn. Needless to say, the mood was grim on the streets of L.A. that Sunday. Inside The Regent, though, at a little after 7:30 p.m., the vibe was dynamic. Agender was in the midst of their opening set for CSS. The floor level of the venue was already packed wall-to-wall. The balcony, where I stood, was quite full as well. Looking down, a mass of people bopped around the floor as the L.A. punk band ripped through one fierce song after the next.
“I think it was a moment of the city coming together and it felt special,” says Romy Hoffman, who is the singer, guitarist and songwriter for Agender. “I know I needed that outlet.” Hoffman, who has known CSS since a previous project of hers toured Australia with them in the mid-‘00s, notes that the Brazilian indie band has a “positive, infectious energy” that lent itself to the “catharsis” inside the venue that night. “It was the perfect band to play at that time just because of their energy,” she says. “We had a great time and the crowd was really responsive. It was wonderful.”
There’s a lot of catharsis in Agender’s music as well. What started as Hoffman’s solo project back in 2011 has since grown into a four-piece rounded out by Cristy Michel (bass), Christy Greenwood (drums) and Sara Rivas (synths). Their third album, Berserk, is out now. Co-produced by Hoffman and David Scott Stone (LCD Soundsystem), Berserk covers a vast expanse of punk rock that’s eclectic in style, but uniform in its raw energy. “Our albums are kind of like mix tapes and pastiches of different parts of punk,” says Hoffman. So, you get a bit of the classic pop-punk bounce with “Logo” and “Jeans” and a little synthpunk pogo on “Life Is Acid,” “Vacuums” and “I Need a Break from the USA.” Meanwhile, “Dissonant Disco” veers towards an Xmal Deutschland-meets-Babes in Toyland goth-punk sound and “Damaged Girls” gets into a Gang of Four groove.
“It is all within the umbrella of punk, but so many different aspects of it,” says Hoffman. “It feels comfortable for me to write like that to get my message across. Some songs need to be fast and furious.”
And some need to pulse through a club’s soundsystem. Take, for example, “Things Things Things,” a disco-punk banger in the vein of “The Clash’s “Magnificent Seven” and The Rapture’s “House of Jealous Lovers.” Hoffman is also a DJ and wanted to incorporate some club-friendly music into the album. “A fast punk song is hard to mix in, so I kind of did want to make a dance floor, happy song that could fit in a DJ set with disco punk-y stuff and dance music, house-y stuff, that sits at 120 beats per minute,” she says. “I have mixed [“Things Things Things”} into my DJ sets and played it alongside ESG songs or a Rapture song or a ‘90s house song.”
“Things Things Things” is also a sharp, witty and poignant slice of life in a timeline where hyper-consumerism and increasingly bleak news collide. Hoffman recites her favorite line in the song, “I’m a material girl, not a moralist/ I know everything is bad, I just want to look good for the apocalypse.” That’s also my favorite line in “Things Things Things,” a cheeky and blunt commentary on the paradoxes ingrained in 21st century life.
“It’s kind of tongue-in-cheek and snarky and sarcastic, but I’m being serious,” says Hoffman. “Consumption and buying all these things, having all these things, they don’t ground you. You can’t hold on to them. Things come and go. There is no ethical consumption under capitalism, I think, is the main thing that I wanted to say in that song”
At the same time, she’s asking, and prompting us to ask ourselves, if consumption is always bad. “Also,” Hoffman adds, “the world is falling apart. Is it bad to want to look good and have nice things and enjoy yourself at the same time?”
Throughout the album, Hoffman’s lyrics bridge introspection with astute cultural observations. If there’s a throughline for the album, she says, “Maybe it’s that we’re all just wounded people navigating a wounded world.”
“But,” she adds, “it’s also my point of view, me trying to navigate an ever-changing, really crazy world. Living in the hyper-information age of capitalism, self-improvement culture. I think it’s all those things and just trying to make sense of it all.”
The timeline shifts so swiftly, though, that plenty has changed between the completion of Berserk and its release. “I do think we’re in a whole new era and maybe this is the last vestige of what that old chapter was like,” she says.
Hoffman, who does see her songwriting as a form of journalism, has been collecting ideas for the next album. “There’s almost too much to say and nothing to say. I’m scared of having to write a record in the Trump era with that bombardment,” she says. “This is about life and death stuff that is happening to us. It’s not the luxury of writing about information and hyper-consumption.”
On stage at the Regent, it was clear that Agender had connected with the crowd and that everyone was working through their emotions from a very heavy start to 2025 during that set. So, it’s not surprising that this interview ends with some words regarding the future. “Protect each other. Stay close. Community is everything during these times,” Hoffman says. “If anyone wants to reach out and has anything to say about the record or talk about anything, I’m available. Stay safe out there. Hold each other close.”
Berserk by Agender is out now. If you’re in L.A., RSVP for Agender’s record release party at Zebulon on Friday, March 28. The band will play live, with support from Muscle Beach and DJ Allison Wolfe (Bratmobile).
Liz O. is an L.A.-based writer and DJ. Read her recently published work and check out her upcoming gigs or listen to the latest Beatique Mix. Follow on Instagram or Bluesky for more updates.
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CSS Live at The Regent January 19, 2025