Listen to a basement emo gem from Chicago

Retirement Party is a Chicago band with song titles like "My Chapstick Melted In The Dryer" and "Passion Fruit Tea." They make a specific type of basement emo, the kind of wordy and ramshackle sing-a-longs that you'd expect from songwriters who grew up in suburbs listening to Green Day. It's a style that, unless I fall off a yacht and get amnesia, I'm pretty sure I will always love. Their first full-length album, called Somewhat Literate, comes out in May.

Today they're debuting "Shoulder It," an album cut that wouldn't be out of place on the Empire Records soundtrack. The song is a bittersweet shredder, one that finds vocalist Avery Springer looking back with fresh eyes: "You had your place here / but now I'm stuck carrying all the weight," she sings on the hook, "but it's alright / because you taught me to shoulder it." It's an uptempo, super-catchy take on a genre of song that usually makes me a little weepy — the ones about a relationship that, though doomed, changes your life for the better.