Artist

BODEGA

New York City, United States • Formed 2016

BODEGA is a music group from New York City, United States, active since 2016. Their discography on Gatefold includes 4 records.

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4

Albums tracked

7

In collections

2016

Since

Biography

The art-damaged Brooklyn band Bodega want to get people thinking while they boogie, and their 2018 debut album, Endless Scroll, spotlighted an abrasive dance-punk sound built on shouted vocals, deep thoughts, and jumpy rhythms. While they sanded off some of the rough sonic edges on subsequent releases like 2019's Shiny New Model EP and 2022's Broken Equipment, they kept the lyrics sharp and the music bouncy. In 2024, they made a jump to a major label with Our Brand Could Be Yr Life and responded with their tightest, most melodic set yet.

The Arc of BODEGA

The pivots — what forced BODEGA to reinvent.

  1. The 8-Track Manifesto

    Austin Brown of Parquet Courts produced Endless Scroll live to a half-inch reel-to-reel Tascam 388, forcing the band into raw, minimal takes. Ben Hozie's deadpan snarl and Nikki Belfiglio's stand-up percussion anchored a hyper-cynical critique of algorithmic culture and internet alienation. The resulting sound was brittle, immediate, and packed with no-wave rhythm section dynamics that caught fire across European indie clubs.

  2. The Post-Pandemic Overhaul

    After the touring cycle grind and lockdown stalled their momentum, the group retooled with guitarist Dan Ryan and bassist Adam See to track Broken Equipment. The production cleaned up significantly, leaning away from pure scratchy no-wave and incorporating hip-hop drum loops, disco grooves, and brighter indie-rock melodies. Belfiglio also stepped into the spotlight with 'Statuette On The Console,' releasing it in nine different languages as a multilingual concept single.

  3. Excavating the Archives

    For Our Brand Could Be Yr Life, Hozie and Belfiglio took the old catalog of their defunct pre-BODEGA outfit, Bodega Bay, and completely re-tracked the songs from scratch. With a stabilized lineup, they traded lo-fi art-school noise for tight power-pop riffs, dynamic post-punk interplay, and sharper lyrical barbs. It forced their scrappy conceptual origins into direct conversation with their tighter, heavier modern live chops.

Influences

  • The Fall — Mark E. Smith's sardonic talk-singing and repetition-heavy rhythm section serve as the foundational structural blueprint for Ben Hozie's lyricism. You hear it front and center on 'Jack in Titanic,' where monotonous post-punk grooves collide with verbose, dry-witted social commentary. It is British working-class cynicism filtered through Brooklyn gentrification.
  • Gang of Four — The band openly lifts Andy Gill's slashed, treble-spiked Stratocaster attack and Hugo Burnham's four-on-the-floor punk-funk drumming. On tracks like 'How Did This Happen?!', the brittle funk bassline and metallic guitar stabs mirror Entertainment! beat for beat. It is Marxist critique made danceable for people who hate dancing.
  • LCD Soundsystem — James Murphy established the modern Brooklyn template for neurotically narrating consumer culture and hipster existentialism over four-minute dance beats. BODEGA takes that vocal self-awareness and injects it straight into tracks like 'Bookmarks' and 'Can't Knock the Hustle'. Both acts share a fixation on record collections, scene burnout, and aging out of DIY spaces.
  • The B-52's — Nikki Belfiglio's vocal call-and-response dynamics and whimsical deadpan delivery directly echo Cindy Wilson and Kate Pierson's party-meets-post-punk interplay. Songs like 'Shiny New Model' lean heavy on quirky vocal layering and minimalist, stand-up percussion. It keeps the band's brainy anti-capitalist themes from sinking into total self-serious drudgery.
  • Minutemen — The band named their 2024 LP after Mike Watt's famous mantra and borrowed D. Boon's ethos of cramming intense political rants into sub-two-minute guitar jams. The short, spastic bursts on Endless Scroll replicate the frantic, zero-filler structure of Double Nickels on the Dime. Every riff hits its mark, delivers the punchline, and cuts out before overstaying its welcome.

Discography

Their records — most-collected first.

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