With a steady stream of singles and EPs over the 2020s, Softcult have been so active and omnipresent in DIY shoegaze circles that it’s hard to believe When a Flower Doesn’t Grow is their first proper album. The twin-sister duo’s debut full-length represents a consolidation of strengths, fusing their dual loves of 4AD-schooled dream pop and grungy ’90s alt-rock into a sound that’s as heavy as it is heady: “Pill to Swallow” may evoke the gossamer melodies of an early Lush track, but its jittery backbeat leads to a chorus that blasts off like a rocket. And though shoegaze is a genre that traditionally revels in vocal and lyrical ambiguity, singer/guitarist Mercedes Arn-Horn is not one to mince words: “16/25” is an urgent condemnation of adult men who prey on teenage girls, while “She Said, He Said” sets its crosshairs on toxic dudes cosplaying as nice guys, yielding a punk-powered rager in which the Arn-Horns get to unleash their inner riot grrrls.