All Belief Is Paradise is the debut album from Fits, a Brooklyn four-piece headed by Nicholas Cummins. The bulk of its songs were written in reaction to the death of a Cummins' mother, an event that involved revisiting a difficult childhood and staking claim to Cummins' own queer identity. A onetime bass player for PWR BTTM and Fern Mayo, among several other Brooklyn bands, the songwriter is joined here by guitarist Joe Galarraga (Big Ups), bassist Emma Witmer (aka gobbinjr), and drummer Brian Orante (Fern Mayo). Fits' sound is their own, though, approximating a version 2010s Brooklyn singer/songwriter lo-fi with splashes of Pavement, bratty punk-pop, and irregular doses of mathy rhythms, shifting time signatures, and unison riffs. With 12 songs lasting a total of 20 minutes, All Belief Is Paradise is angsty, candid, and concise, setting lyrics like "What we had was dead, but now it's superdead" to an under-two-minute grunge waltz. The uber-hooky "All the Time" asserts desires in contrasting sections of calmer, sparer solo vocals and melodic group shouting. The group stanzas kick in with guitar distortion and feedback, and let the honesty fly. Even a more ambling song with a title like "Ice Cream on a Nice Day" is loaded with rumination and a self-consciousness that seems to be expelled just before the end, in a fleeting burst of churning guitars and full-on rock drums. For all of the grief and frustration behind it, it's an impulsive, infectious album that offers up catharsis for the songwriter and listeners alike.