BULLETT

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti have a new album, Mature Themes, out next week; as the stream shows, it’s a fairly strange take on ’70s AM rock, which may or may not be your thing. Either way, there’s another point of interest regarding the album: former Haunted Graffiti drummer Aaron Sperske is suing the rest of the band for forcing him out earlier this year. You can read through the lawsuit (which reveals that Pink’s real last name is Rosenberg!), but there are two main takeaways: Sperske seeks 25% ownership in Mature Themes based on an “oral partnership” from 2008, and a $1 million payoff for incurred damages. Which, wow, $1 million! I don’t know if Sperske remembers his old band that well, but there’s no way they have that much scratch; I saw Ariel Pink play once at some horrible Bushwick warehouse on New Year’s Eve in 2010, and he spent a half-hour lecturing the crowd over a backing track while stumbling about in some drug-induced haze. I know this wouldn’t pass the smell test at the bank, but based off that one interaction, I can’t possibly imagine that his finances are that immaculate. We’ll see how this develops over the next few months; Mature Themes is due out on August 21.