Live concert photography from Elsewhere Festival’s first day feat, Killer Mike, Snow Tha Product, A Place to Bury Strangers, TOKiMonsta, D. Smoke and Zuzu’s Petals.
Category: Shoegaze
New Video: JOVM Mainstays A Place to Bury Strangers Share Anthemic and Mosh Pit Friendly “Disgust”
New York-based JOVM mainstays A Place to Bury Strangers — currently Oliver Ackermann (vocals, guitar), John Fedowitz (bass) and Sandra Fedowitz (drums) — will be releasing their seventh album Synthesizer on October 4, 2024 through Dedstrange records.
While Synthesizer is the album’s title, it’s also a physical entity, a synthesizer specifically made for the album — and a synthesizer that you too, can own (in part), if you buy the record on vinyl. The album’s cover art doubles as a circuit board and functional synth for curious and enterprising fans. “It’s pretty messed up, chaotic. But it feels really human,” the band’s Oliver Ackermann says.
In an era of making music where so little is DIY and so much is left up to AI, never setting foot in a practice room or a home studio, making something that feels deliberately chaotic, messy, and human, is entirely the point. The album celebrates sounds that are spontaneous and natural, the kind of music that can only come from collaboration and community.
The writing sessions for Synthesizer started in the band’s Queens studio, shortly after the release of 2022’s See Through You. The new lineup which featured Ackermann and his friends John and Sandra Fedowitz was especially inspiring for Ackermann. “It felt like a fresh new thing,” he says. “I wanted to write songs everyone was excited about playing.”
The album captures the band at a place of reinvention, where they take a carefully honed sound and approach and crack it wide open to gut its then reimagine it. And of course, to ever so slightly reinvent one’s sound, one must also built a new instrument — the synthesizer at the core of the album’s overall sound.
Reportedly, Synthesizer is arguably one of the band’s most live-sounding albums to date, accurately capturing the rawness and explosiveness of the band in a live setting, which is a fitting for a band that is best in a live setting, where the material takes on a new energy in the presence of a crowd. “We’re artists,” Ackermann says, “Going to shows and bringing that imperfect and beautiful DIY ethos is important.”
Synthesizer’s first single “Disgust” is a bit of classic APTBS, an eardrum shattering aural assault, anchored around explosively wailing feedback and distortion pedaled guitar lines, and a relentless motorik groove featuring an arpeggiating bass line weaving in and out of the driving bass — but with subtle refinements, including some of the most rousingly anthemic, mosh pit friendly choruses and hooks I’ve heard from the band in some time.
“‘Disgust’ is a song I wrote that was inspired by the way I used to perform ‘Got That Feeling,’ a song by my old band Skywave,” Ackermann explains. “There was a long riding open note on the bass that enabled me to play the whole part with my fist in the air. I wrote this song just on open strings so it could be played with just one hand: dumb and fun.”
Directed by BODEGA’S Ben Hozie and filmed by Joe Wakeman, the accompanying video for “Disgust” features frames within frames within frames, and frames the band next to and within distorted images on TVs to “achieve a certain style of cine-cubism where the band members can be seen from multiple angles at once in the same frame,” BODEGA’s Hozie says, He adds, “This sense of dissociative texture is exactly what A Place to Bury Strangers music feels like to me,” Hozie says, “I was trying to create a visual accompaniment to the disorienting buzzy speed of the band’s grooves and bliss of their distorted overtones.”
New Video: JOVM Mainstays GIFT Shares Brooding “Later”
JOVM mainstays GIFT — TJ Freda (vocals, guitar), multi-instrumentalist Jessica Gurewitz, Kallan Campbell (bass), multi-instrumentalist Justin Hrabovsky and Gabe Camarano (drums) — formed just before the COVID-19 pandemic. And although 2020 wasn’t exactly the most ideal time to start a band, especially for a group of musicians with varying and diverse roots and professional backgrounds, Freda assembled the band by cherry-picking members of some of his favorite local bands, crossed his fingers and hoped for the best. Professionally, the members of the rising Brooklyn-based outfit are firmly enmeshed in the local scene as talent buyers, photographers, DJs, audio engineers, art directors, and in the case of Campbell, the owner of Bushwick-based DIY venue Alphaville.
The JOVM mainstays signed to Captured Tracks, who will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore, 11-song album Illuminator on August 23, 2024. The album reportedly sees the quintet firmly cementing their sound with a remarkably mature, self-assuredness for a relatively young band. The continued melting pot of their combined skills and experiences helps make the album an even more cohesive listening experience. The album sees increasing contributions from the band’s members: Gurewitz, a relative newcomer to making music, contributed a host of lyrics and vocal melodies. Hrabovsky, who previously engineered at Asheville, NC-based Drop of Sun Studios and Echo Mountain Recording shared production duties with Freda. And Camarano’s drumming provided the crucial rhythmic underpinning of the album’s material.
“We had a lot more confidence going in,” Freda says. “The main goal was to take a big swing, embrace the pop sounds we love and clear the mist and clouds surrounding the last record to make it a lot punchier.”
Illuminator will feature:
“Wish Me Away,” a track anchored around a dreamy and hook-driven shoegazer soundscape of glistening, reverb-drenched guitars, woozy synths and a motorik groove paired with propulsive rhythms serving as a lush bed for Freda’s plaintive falsetto, “Wish Me Away” is continuation of the overall aesthetic they established on Momentary Presence and a decided sonic push forward, showcasing where the band is going next. The song also sees the band exploring and expressing a complex array of emotions with a lived-in specificity.
“‘Wish Me Away’ is about giving into the feeling of everything slipping away,” GIFT’s TJ Freda explains. “Just take it all away, put me out of my misery, wish me away. While this all seems daunting and sad, there’s a feeling of optimism in this song, holding on for dear life and refusing to give up hope.”
After nearly losing a loved one, Freda found himself grappling with the fleeting nature of life, and understandably with the inevitability of mortality. “‘Wish Me Away,’ ruminates on the fear and freedom that can come knowing it can all slip away. The line ‘wish me away’ kept coming up, as in ‘take me, not them,’” Freda adds.
“Going In Circles,” an Evil Heat-era Primal Scream take on shoegaze, built around a motorik groove, glistening and atmospheric synths, swirling reverb-soaked guitar textures and Freda’s dreamily plaintive delivery paired with the quintet’s unerring knack for rousingly anthemic hooks and chorus. But underneath the euphoria-inducing nature of the song is a bitter lament of a relationship gone a bit awry.
“This was the first song I wrote for Illuminator that helped me realize the direction of the album,” GIFT’s TJ Freda says. “I wrote the chorus while passively playing guitar and rushed to record the idea. At that moment, something clicked and I realized where the album was going. At our shows from the Momentary Presence tour, people would stand in the crowd wide-eyed without moving. We wanted to get people moving with the new album, so we were really inspired by bands like Primal Scream, Oasis, and Massive Attack. It’s our psych-rock tribute to U.K. rave culture in the ‘90s.
“The song is about the endless cycle of a relationship,” Freda adds, “the back and forth in both euphoria and doubt. The chorus ‘I never told you why’ is about never being able to say how you really feel, not having closure and the cycle continuing.”
Illuminator’s third and latest single is the Jessica Gurewitz and TJ Freda co-written “Later.” Arguably one of the more brooding and uneasy songs of the JOVM mainstays’ growing catalog, “Later” is anchored around a swaggering motorik groove, glistening and reverb drenched guitars paired with Freda’s plaintive falsetto and the band’s unerring knack for rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses. But interestingly enough, the new single may also be the more straightforward shoegazer track of the album, as well.
“While writing Illuminator I found myself clinging to intense emotions, reluctant to release them. ‘Later’ stands out as one of the darkest songs I’ve made,” Freda explains. “Making it was cathartic, diving into darker themes. The song explores surrendering to the overwhelming sensation of life slipping away before my eyes.”
Co-directed by Sophia Feuer and the band’s Jessica Gurewitz, “the accompanying video for “Later” continues a remarkable run of cinematic and surreal visuals. We follow the band’s Gurewitz as she embarks on a lengthy journey by foot through the woods, a struggling and run down city — and in some way through time, thanks to the use of some flashbacks with stock footage, old photos and more.
“I wanted to explore the internal confusion that comes with the passage of time. I was reading a lot of horror stories while we shot this and I wanted to bring those to the screen by exploring unknown places and questioning timelines,” Gurewitz says. “Working with Sophia Feuer (Director, DP, Editor) was amazing and she made it possible to bring this vision to life.“
New Video: JOVM Mainstays GIFT Shares Rousingly Euphoric “Going In Circles”
Brooklyn-based psych rock quintet GIFT — TJ Freda (vocals, guitar), multi-instrumentalist Jessica Gurewitz, Kallan Campbell (bass), multi-instrumentalist Justin Hrabovsky and Gabe Camarano (drums) — formed just before the COVID-19 pandemic. And although 2020 wasn’t exactly the most ideal time to start a band, especially for a group of musicians with varying and diverse roots and professional backgrounds, Freda assembled the band by cherry-picking members of some of his favorite local bands, crossed his fingers and hoped for the best. Professionally, the members of the rising Brooklyn-based outfit are firmly enmeshed in the local scene as talent buyers, photographers, DJs, audio engineers, art directors, and in the case of Campbell, the owner of Bushwick-based DIY venue Alphaville.
Inspired by Ram Dass’ 1971 spiritual guide and countercultural landmark Be Here Now, the JOVM mainstays full-length debut, 2022’s Momentary Presencewas a meditation on working through the anxiety and self-doubt that we all, at some point or another, carry. Specifically conceived, written and recorded with the idea of a full-length album being a fully contained work of art, the songs on Momentary Presence featured dense layered productions that feel and sound self-assured, complete, definitive and impermeable. This is rooted in the band’s belief that each moment has richness, complexity and singularity. And once it’s gone, it can’t be recaptured or repeated.
The album asked the listener several key questions: Can you truly be present? Can you open yourself up and appreciate life in its fullness — the ugliness and confusion, as well as the beauty and joy? The members of GIFT believe that the listener can. And their full-length debut is a chronicle of that chase, and a celebration of the eternal now.
The band leaned on their collective experiences in the behind-the-scenes and non-performing aspects of the music business as part of settling on a bold sound — a dizzying blend of early shoegaze, 90s alt rock and modern pop. The album quickly caught the attention of hungry shoegazers and cognoscenti looking for the new thing across the States, Europe and elsewhere.
The JOVM mainstays signed to Captured Tracks, who will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore, 11-song album Illuminator on August 23, 2024. The album reportedly sees the quintet firmly cementing their sound with a remarkably mature, self-assuredness for a relatively young band. The continued melting pot of their combined skills and experiences helps make the album an even more cohesive listening experience. The album sees increasing contributions from the band’s members: Gurewitz, a relative newcomer to making music, contributed a host of lyrics and vocal melodies. Hrabovsky, who previously engineered at Asheville, NC-based Drop of Sun Studios and Echo Mountain Recording shared production duties with Freda. And Camarano’s drumming provided the crucial rhythmic underpinning of the album’s material.
“We had a lot more confidence going in,” Freda says. “The main goal was to take a big swing, embrace the pop sounds we love and clear the mist and clouds surrounding the last record to make it a lot punchier.”
Illuminator will feature the previously released single “Wish Me Away.” Anchored around a dreamy and hook-driven shoegazer soundscape of glistening, reverb-drenched guitars, woozy synths and a motorik groove paired with propulsive rhythms serving as a lush bed for Freda’s plaintive falsetto, “Wish Me Away” is continuation of the overall aesthetic they established on Momentary Presence and a decided sonic push forward, showcasing where the band is going next. The song also sees the band exploring and expressing a complex array of emotions with a lived-in specificity.
“‘Wish Me Away’ is about giving into the feeling of everything slipping away,” GIFT’s TJ Freda explains. “Just take it all away, put me out of my misery, wish me away. While this all seems daunting and sad, there’s a feeling of optimism in this song, holding on for dear life and refusing to give up hope.”
After nearly losing a loved one, Freda found himself grappling with the fleeting nature of life, and understandably with the inevitability of mortality. “‘Wish Me Away,’ ruminates on the fear and freedom that can come knowing it can all slip away. The line ‘wish me away’ kept coming up, as in ‘take me, not them,’” Freda adds.
“Going In Circles,” Illumiunator‘s second and latest single is an Evil Heat-era Primal Scream take on shoegaze, built around a motorik groove, glistening and atmospheric synths, swirling reverb-soaked guitar textures and Freda’s dreamily plaintive delivery paired with the quintet’s unerring knack for rousingly anthemic hooks and chorus. But underneath the euphoria-inducing nature of the song is a bitter lament of a relationship gone a bit awry.
“This was the first song I wrote for Illuminator that helped me realize the direction of the album,” GIFT’s TJ Freda says. “I wrote the chorus while passively playing guitar and rushed to record the idea. At that moment, something clicked and I realized where the album was going. At our shows from the Momentary Presence tour, people would stand in the crowd wide-eyed without moving. We wanted to get people moving with the new album, so we were really inspired by bands like Primal Scream, Oasis, and Massive Attack. It’s our psych-rock tribute to U.K. rave culture in the ‘90s.
“The song is about the endless cycle of a relationship,” Freda adds, “the back and forth in both euphoria and doubt. The chorus ‘I never told you why’ is about never being able to say how you really feel, not having closure and the cycle continuing.”
Directed by Dannah Gottlieb, Alexander Baumann and Robert Ruth features some dreamily hazy and intimately shot footage of the band performing the song in a studio. The video becomes increasingly hallucinogenic affair with the band’s members and their instruments morphing and twisting seemingly at will.
New Video: Miki Berenyi Trio Shares Dreamy and Meditative “Vertigo”
Miki Berenyi Trio features an acclaimed and accomplished group of artists:
- Miki Berenyi (vocals/ guitar), a founding member, frontperson and rhythm guitarist of acclaimed and iconic shoegazer outfit Lush — and the founder and frontperson of acclaimed outfit Piroshka
- Kevin “Moose” McKillop (guitar), a founding member of acclaimed shoegazers Moose, Berenyi’s spouse and Piroshka bandmate
- Oliver Cherer (bass)
- Michael Conroy (bass), a member of beloved post punk outfit Modern English, who had a stint as McKillop’s bandmate in Moose and sat in on Lush’s last live show ever — and a member of Piroshka with Berenyi and McKillop, will be joining the band for their forthcoming Stateside tour
The trio’s first official single “Vertigo,” is a gorgeous and meditative track anchored around skittering heartbeat-like thump, atmospheric synths, swirling shoegazer guitar textures. The song’s arrangement and production serves as an atmospheric yet lush bed for Berenyi’s imitable ethereal and yearning delivery talking herself — and all of us, really — down from the precipice of endless anxiety and dread.
“Vertigo” has been a part of the band’s live set for over a year, and is one o the first songs they wrote together. “‘Vertigo’ is about anxiety and the efforts to talk myself down from the precipice – the usual cheerful stuff,” Berenyi explains. Talking about the recording process, she adds, ““It’s a challenge to not have a drummer, and to use more programming, but the essence of the music is still guitars and melody – as it always has been, particularly in mine and Moose’s bands.”
The accompanying video was filmed by French director Sébastien Faits-Divers in Dijon‘s Consortium Museum (Contemporary Art Center) in one of the Isabella Ducrot exhibition rooms, capturing the trio performing the song in the round — and surrounded by remarkably childlike and dream-like art.
New Audio: Draag Shares Ominous “Microgravity tank”
Los Angeles-based musician Adrian Acosta was trained as a mariachi singer by his father, an established norteño musician, but after finding his older brother’s electric guitar, Acosta quickly got into indie rock and shoegaze. Growing up in Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley, there wasn’t much for kids to do; but Acosta got involved in the local DIY punk scene as a preteen. Backyard shows happened every weekend by word-of-mouth and through flyers handed out at school — with some shows ending in drive-by shootings from rival gangs.
As a 10 year-old, Acosta recorded songs on a karaoke tape deck. Shortly after, he purposely used warped tapes and dissonant sounds without understanding what he loved about it, but upon discovering acts like My Bloody Valentine, Boards of Canada, and Throbbing Gristle, he began to realize that he wasn’t the only one.
Acota initially started the rising shoegazer outfit Draag nas a solo recording project but after meeting Ray Montes (guitar), Nick Kelley (bass) and Eric Fabbro (drums) through their many years in the local music community, the band began to coalesce as the full realization of what Acosta had always dreamt of creating while connecting with like-minded artists, who were also deeply involved in the local scene.
Jessica Huang (synth, vocals) joined the band after replying to a Craigslist ad, completing the band’s lineup. Huang’s background was different than her four bandmates: Huang is classically trained in piano, and she played the alto sax in marching bands. And instead of hanging out at backyard shows, she spent her free time on Tumblr. The band initially set about reviving songs from a karaoke tape deck that Acosta recorded when he was 10. They quickly became a buzz-worthy local act, playing shows with Wednesday, Reggie Watts, Mint Field and a lengthy list of others. Then the Los Angeles-based shoegazers released two critically applauded EPs, 2018’s Nontoxic Process and 2020’s Clara Luz and last year’s full-length debut Dark Fire Heresy.
Slated for a May 17, 2024 release though They Are Gutting A Body of Water’s label Julia’s War Recordings, Actually, the quiet is nice is the follow-up to Dark Fire Heresy while marking the first release through their new label home. The EP reportedly explores the liminal space between albums and the far reaching corners of the band’s sound. Inspired by TikTok slides of anonymous Flickr uploads of someone’s friends, neighborhoods on a summer day, their bedroom and the like, the EP’s material delves into an obsession with a particular feeling in childhood, while knowing that you could be back. but no one would be home. The EP is also informed by the experience of growing up with immigrant parents in the suburbs in the 90s.
Last month, I wrote about the EP’s first single “Orb Weaver,” a nostalgia-inducing track that brought back memories of 120 Minutes MTV-era alt rock and warm, carefree summer days without much to really do besides bullshit, get high and listen to your favorite tunes. The song’s warped and densely textured guitars provide a laconic and buzzing backdrop for Haung and Acosta’s dreamily yearning harmonies.
“Jess and I go on night walks in our neighborhood often, probably because there’s no one around and we are obsessed with the eerie nostalgic quality of empty neighborhoods,” Draag’s Acosta explains. “One summer, it was very hard to walk without running into a big orb weaver web. I have a severe fear of spiders. I used the night walks as a form of therapy but it got me in a fearful state instead and dwelling on dark thoughts.”
Actually, the quiet is nice‘s second and latest single “Microgravity tank” is a brooding and ominous track anchored around detuned and buzzing guitars, bursts of twinkling keys, a laconic groove paired with Acosta and Huang’s eerily spectral harmonies. “Microgravity tank” evokes a lingering sense of dread, and the acknowledgement of getting older.
“I used to live in a house that had this very unusual energy,” Draag’s Adrian Acosta explains. “It’s the kind of energy I could only connect to that specific house. It was quite haunting. Every few months or so, I’ll have a Deja vu moment that brings me back to that house. When it fades, all I can think about is how my better years are behind me.”
The accompanying visualizer is unsettling, surreal and hypnotic, as it features a person wearing a Dora the Explorer costume playing in a playground. The band’s Jessica Huang is Dora’s caretaker/babysitter or something.
New Video: Denmark’s 802 Shares a Mind-Bending, Genre-Defying Ripper
At one point, Andreas “Slowoff” Asingh was one of the most critically acclaimed electronic artists in Denmark, working with internationally renowned artists like Raekwon while touring the world. Eventually, life’s twist and turns took Asingh […]
New Audio: Kai Tak Teams up with There’s Talk on Ethereal and Brooding “Flood The Harbour”
Born in Hong Kong and adopted by American parents, who worked at a camp for Vietnamese refugees seeking opportunity in the city nicknamed the Pearl of the Orient, the Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist and producerChris King may be best known for his work in Cold Showers and his production work for a list of artists that include Tamaryn, House of Harm and Fearing.
Led by King, the Los Angeles-based collective Kai Tak derives its name from the now-retired Hong Kong airport, famously known for its harrowing approach just above and through the city’s skyscrapers. Founded during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when King started to write songs as a vehicle for connecting with his own unconventional roots — and as a platform for collaboration with the numerous musical friends made from his lengthy career as a producer and engineer.
Operating without any deadlines or creative constraints allowed King to use and explore every technique he had learned over the years, incorporating re-sampling, drastic pitch shifting, time-stretching, liberal use of tape delay, recording live drums with MIDI drum triggers, and creating his own sample-based synthesizers using found sounds recorded during various trips to Hong Kong.
The Los Angeles-based collective’s highly-anticipated full-length debut, Designed In Heaven Made In Hong Kong is slated for a June 21, 2024 release through á La Carte Records. The album sees King and collaborators specializing in sculpted, moody soundscapes that draw inspirations from shoegaze, trip hop and electronica. The album will feature three previously released tracks:
“Jalen Rose,” feat. Draag
“Villains In My Mind,” feat. Foie Gras
“Blush,” feat. Dol Ikara‘s Claire Roddy. The collaboration can be traced back to when the two artists were placed together by chance at a live show. “Blush,” is built around a brooding and cinematic arrangement that — to my ears — sounds like a synthesis of Massive Attack and Cocteau Twins with the song featuring skittering boom bap and a looping glistening string sample paired with swirling shoegazer guitar textures serving as a lush bed for Roddy’s soulful, smoky croon.
“Chris came to me with this transportive instrumental while I was dealing with a bit of a writer’s block,” Roddy explains. “These lyrics are an ode to that very moment of inspiration where suddenly feelings, words, and melodies spring right out from the drought, as instantly and vulnerably as a blush.”
“When Claire explained the meaning behind her lyrics, I almost couldn’t believe it,” Kai Tak’s Chris King explains. “The music also came to me during a bout of writer’s block, which was broken by one of my old tried and true methods – watching a visually stunning movie on mute and composing music inspired by the imagery. In the case of ‘Blush,’ the inspiration was Fallen Angels, which has always made me feel like I’m permanently suspended in the most beautiful fever dream.”
Designed In Heaven Made In Hong Kong‘s fourth and latest single, the brooding “Flood The Harbour” seems to sonically channel Garlands and Heaven or Las Vegas-era Cocteau Twins: swirling shoegazer guitar textures are paired with swaggering and thumping, boom bap-like drums and a supple bass line create a lush and dreamy bed for There’s Talk’s Olivia Lee’s gorgeous and expressive vocal fed through a little bit of reverb. Throughout the song evokes the existential unease and dread of our current moment — with the acknowledgment that the our current world is on its death knell, and the hope that we’re on the precipice of a new, fairer world for all.
“The music for ‘Flood The Harbour’ was written on the same day I wrote ‘Blush.’ After feeling uninspired for a long time, I spent the day repeatedly watching Fallen Angels on mute while messing around with instruments, and 90% of both songs were written in a few hours,” King explains. “Whenever I’m working on something new, I always give the songs a temporary working title of the neighborhood that inspired the tune, or that I’m using found samples from, and this song drew from Yau Ma Tei. Formerly a little fishing bay, Yau Ma Tei has been built extensively upon reclaimed land. Because of Hong Kong’s limited usable land and massive population density, land reclamation has been a central part of the city’s growth over the past century – over 60 km of land has been added to the city from land reclamation projects, including part of the old Kai Tak airport, and just thinking about land reclamation and its endless ripples helped shape the song.”
“I aligned on inspiration with Chris – the lyrics came to mind after simmering on the working title for the song, Yau Ma Tei, as well as hazy neon-lit montages from Fallen Angels,” There’s Talk’s Olivia Lee adds. “Sinking into the broodiness of the song, images of a revolution on the heels of the end of the world engulfed in flames and flood came to mind. Perhaps a meditation on the consequences of colonialism and corporate greed, and who will have the last word.”
New Audio: Khotin’s Blissed Out and Ambient Remix of Bodywash’s “Kind of Light”
Montréal-based JOVM mainstays Bodywash — Chris Steward and Rosie Long Dector — can trace their origins back to when the pair met while attending McGill University. But when they met, the pair didn’t immediately share a common musical language: Steward grew up in London listening to celestial dream pop while Dector grew up in Toronto listening to folk and Canadiana. But the music they began writing together saw the pair bridging their influences.
With the release of 2016’s self-titled EP and 2019’s full-length debut, Comforter, the Montréal-based duo firmly established their sound — slow-burning and dreamy material centered around ethereal vocals, intricate guitar lines and pulsating synths.
The Canadian shoegazers’ sophomore album, last year’s I Held the Shape While I Could was inspired and informed by the COVID-19 pandemic and its subsequent lockdowns. The duo used the unexpected hiatus to write new material, which was darker, more experimental and more invigorating than its immediate predecessor. The new material also reflected on Steward’s and Long Doctor’s seperate and shared experiences of losing a sense of place, the way something once solid can slip between your fingers, and their attempts to build something new from the psychological and emotional fallout.
In the lead up to the album’s release, I wrote about several singles, including the album’s first, “Kind of Light,” an expansive track that began with a slow-burning and elegiac intro and a skittering yet propulsive kick pattern that a slowly builds up and breaks out into a high-energy, boom-bap-like breakbeat paired with scorching guitar, and squealing and wobbling bass synths. Long Decter’s ethereal and achingly plaintive vocals are at the front and center, expressing heart-wrenching despair and yet hope. Throughout, the song suggests that while loss is natural and expected, there can be hope; that there are only a handful of things that in our lives that are truly permanent — and that for the most part, it can get better.
“I wrote ‘Kind of Light’ in bed,” Long Decter says. ““It was the fall of 2018 and Chris and I were both going through experiences of learning not to trust what feels like home. He sent me a plugin for a new organ sound, suggesting it might provide inspiration. I sent him back chords, a kick pattern, and some vocals about trying to pull your legs back; trying to take your energy out of the wreckage and put it into yourself. The process of deciding what’s worth keeping, what can be reworked and what gets tossed in the fire. A process that is devastating and also weirdly invigorating, because you can see new possibilities opening up in front of you. And you can start to look for light somewhere else.”
Just ahead of the Montréal-based duo’s North American tour dates with Blushing and Airiel in June, they share a remix of “Kind of Light,” by Edmonton-based electronic artist Khotin. The Khotin remix turns the tense and cathartic original into a blissed out, ambient euphoria that’s perfect for contemplative chill out sessions. (By the way, the Blushing/Airiel/Bodywash tour includes a June 19, 2024 stop at Johnny Brenda‘s, one of my favorite rooms in Philly and a June 20, 2024 stop at Baby’s All Right. The tour dates, as always, are below.)
“Khotin’s Release Spirit was in heavy rotation while we were on the road last year, soundtracking everything from the craggy cliffs of the Pacific Northwest to the dreaded NJ Turnpike, so we were keen to have him remix ‘Kind of Light,’” says the band. “His version takes the tension and catharsis of the original song and injects it with blissed-out euphoria. It’s a track that’s destined for a sunrise slot in the chill-out room, channeling the West Coast rave psychedelia of Pilgrims of the Mind along with the more ambient influences that informed our last record.”
New Audio: Glixen Shares Yearning and Woozy “lust”
Phoenix-based shoegazers Glixen — Aislinn Ritchie (vocals), Esteban Santana (guitar), Keire Johnson (drums) and Sonia Garcia (bass) — was founded back in 2020 by the band’s Aislinn Ritchie, who then enlisted Santana, Johnson, and Garcia to complete the band’s lineup. Emerging from a scene of local DIY artists, the quartet’s unique sound and look set them apart from their counterparts and led to tours across the US alongside bands like Narrow Head, Cowgirl Clue, MSPaint, Hotline TNT, and They’re Gutting A Body of Water.
Glixen’s debut EP She Only Said was released last summer through Julia’s War Recordings. The EP saw the band adding themselves to a list of contemporary shoegaze outfits actively pushing the genre in a new direction — through a playful approach that incorporates ethereal pop vocals and shimmering guitars that are meant to guide you toward the feeling of true self-expression.
Building upon a growing profile, the Phoenix-based shoegazers’ Sonny DiPerri-produced sophomore EP is slated for release later this year through AWAL. The EP will feature the previously released “foreversoon,” a woozy bit of shoegaze built around fuzzy and melodic power chord-driven guitars, thunderous drumming and Ritchie’s tender and ethereal falsetto paired with enormous hooks and choruses. “foreverspoon sees the Phoenix-based outfit taking up a much heavier sound that seemingly channels Souvlaki-era Slowdive, Nowhere-era RIDE, contemporaries like JOVM mainstays Blushing and more.
“‘foreversoon’ represents blissful moments of new love and intimacy,” Glixen’s Aislinn Ritchie explains. “The song harnesses melancholy chords, layered with fuzzy red melodies and gliding guitars that pull you in deeper. I wanted my lyrics to feel like a conversation that expresses my infatuation and sensuality. Time is relentless and memories are fleeting, this song encapsulates those emotions forever.”
Building upon the momentum of “foreversoon,” the sophomore EP’s latest single, “lust” is a woozy track that sees the band continuing to explore a heavier sound — but this time channeling 90s grunge and nu-metal with fuzz and distorted pedaled power chords, down-tuned bass and blissed out rhythms. Ritchie’s yearning vocal ethereally floating over the brooding and muscular arrangement.
“lust” is about the yearning and wanting of somebody and the rush that that person makes you feel,” Glixen’s Aislinn Ritchie explains. “It is a feeling that is shallow, yet it feels intense and passionate but only for a moment. We wanted to take the direction of our sound to a heavier place. I wanted the weight of the sound to crush me.”
Formed back in 2020, Austin-based shoegazers DAIISTAR (pronounced Day-Star) — Alex Capistran (vocals, guitar), Nick Cornetti (drums), Misti Hamrick (bass) and Derek Strahan (keys) — have established a narcotic blend of noise and melody that draws from the neo-psychedelic era of the 80s and 90s, but modernizes it with modulating synths, heavy guitars, bouncing bass lines and spiraling hooks.
The Austin shoegeazer outfit’s Alex Maas-produced full-length debut, last year’s GoodTime featured the fuzzy The Jesus and Mary Chain-meets- Crocodiles-like “Parallel” and revealed a band that paid a remarkable amount of attention to craft with a penchant for catchy hooks. The band supported the album touring across North America with The Black Angels, The Brian Jonestown Massacre and The Dandy Warhols, and included festival circuit stops at Levitation, Desert Daze, SXSW, Freak Out, Treefort, as well as a KEXP session.
The Austin shoegazers are currently on a European tour. Those tour dates are below. But they’ll be releasing the “Clear”/”Velvet Reality (Sonic Boom ” Remix 7 inch through Fuzz Club. Slated for a May 10, 2024 release, the 7 inch will feature “Clear,” a previously unreleased song recored during the GoodTime sessions. “Clear” is a reverb-drenched bliss bomb featuring shimmering synths, Capistran’s dreamily delivered falsetto paired with a slow-burning groove. The song, to me at least, brings road trips on glorious, sunny afternoons — full of hope, possibility, life-altering adventures and laughs.
DAIISTAR’s Alex Capistran (guitar/vocals) explained that “the idea behind ‘Clear’ was to write the perfect song for a perfect day. A song that comes to mind on a warm and sunny afternoon; inspiring thoughts of attainable bliss and encouraging you to dream up something nice for your future self.”
Album track “Velvet Reality,” closes out GoodTime with a dreamy, washed-out haze. Spacemen 3 co-founder Pete Kember, a.k.a. Sonic Boom gives “Velvet Reality” the remix treatment, further deconstructing the song by making it even more ethereal and hazier than its original while also giving the oscillating and fluttering synths more of an emphasis. The result is an ethereal and narcoleptic bit of shoegaze seemingly informed by doo wop.
TOUR DATES
4/19 ES BARCELONA – BARCELONA PSYCH FEST
4/20 ES ZARAGOZA – LATA DE BOMBILLAS
4/21 ES SAN SEBASTIAN – DABADABA
4/23 CH BERN – CAFE KAIRO
4/24 IT BOLOGNA – COVO CLUB
4/25 IT ROMA – GLITCH
4/26 IT FIRENZE – THE CAVE
4/27 IT LENO – PRIMO MAGGIO ROCK!
4/30 DE BERLIN – LOOPHOLE
5/1 DE VIECHTACH – ALTES SPITAL
5/2 DE STUTTGART – DIE WAGENHALLEN
5/3 DE FRANKFURT – THE UP CLUB
5/4 NL EINDHOVEN – FUZZ CLUB FEST
5/5 DE GIESSEN – PITS PINTE
5/6 NL AMSTERDAM – OCCII
5/7 NL WAGENINGEN – LOBURG LIVE
5/8 NL THE HAGUE – MUSICON
5/9 FR ROUEN – LE 3 PIECES
5/10 UK LONDON – STRONGROOM
5/11 UK HULL – ALOFT AT THE HAWORTH
5/12 UK GLASGOW – THE OLD HAIRDRESSERS
5/14 UK SOUTHAMPTON – HEARTBREAKER
5/15 UK BRISTOL – CROFTERS RIGHTS
5/16 UK FOLKESTONE – THE CHAMBERS
5/17 FR PARIS LE TRUSKEL – CLUB
5/18 FR LE HAVRE – FOUL WEATHER FESTIVAL
5/21 FR LYON – LE SONIC
5/22 FR BORDEAUX – I-BOAT
5/24 FR PORTSALL – O’DONNEIL IRISH PUB
5/25 FR ANGERS – LEVITATION FESTIVAL
New Video: GIFT Ruminates on Mortality in Brooding “Wish Me Away”
Brooklyn-based psych rock quintet GIFT — TJ Freda (vocals, guitar), multi-instrumentalist Jessica Gurewitz, Kallan Campbell (bass), multi-instrumentalist Justin Hrabovsky and Gabe Camarano (drums) — formed just before the COVID-19 pandemic, and recorded their remarkably self-assured full-length debut 2022’s Momentary Presence during pandemic associated lockdowns and isolation.
Inspired by Ram Dass’ 1971 spiritual guide and countercultural landmark Be Here Now, Momentary Presence was a meditation on working through the anxiety and self-doubt that we all, at some point or another, carry. Specifically conceived, written and recorded with the idea of a full-length album being a fully contained work of art, the songs on Momentary Presence reportedly tease something seismic coming around the corner, while featuring dense layered productions that feel and sound self-assured, complete, definitive and impermeable. This is rooted in the band’s belief that each moment has richness, complexity and singularity. And once it’s gone, it can’t be recaptured or repeated.
The album asks the listener several key questions: Can you truly be present? Can you open yourself up and appreciate life in its fullness — the ugliness and confusion, as well as the beauty and joy? The members of GIFT believe that the listener can. And their full-length debut is a chronicle of that chase, and a celebration of the eternal now.
Sonically, the album saw the band establish an uncanny knack for crating soundscapes that are simultaneously turbulent and gorgeous rooted in a dizzying blend of early shoegaze, 90s alt rock and even modern pop that quickly caught the attention of listeners here in the States, across Europe and elsewhere.
The rising Brooklyn-based JOVM mainstays signed to Captured Tracks, who just released the quintet’s newest single “Wish Me Away,” the first bit of new material from the band in over 18 months. Anchored around a dreamy and hook-driven shoegazer soundscape of glistening, reverb-drenched guitars, woozy synths and a motorik groove paired with propulsive rhythms serving as a lush bed for Freda’s plaintive falsetto, “Wish Me Away” is continuation of the overall aesthetic they established on Momentary Presence and a decided sonic push forward, showcasing where the band is going next. The song also sees the band exploring and expressing a complex array of emotions with a lived-in specificity.
“‘Wish Me Away’ is about giving into the feeling of everything slipping away,” GIFT’s TJ Freda explains. “Just take it all away, put me out of my misery, wish me away. While this all seems daunting and sad, there’s a feeling of optimism in this song, holding on for dear life and refusing to give up hope.”
After nearly losing a loved one, Freda found himself grappling with the fleeting nature of life, and understandably with the inevitability of mortality. “‘Wish Me Away,’ ruminates on the fear and freedom that can come knowing it can all slip away. The line ‘wish me away’ kept coming up, as in ‘take me, not them,'” Freda adds.
Directed by Andrew Gibson, the accompanying video is a woozily surrealistic fever dream that takes place in the sort of mansion that would be the perfect setting of an Edgar Allan Poe novel. But throughout there’s an uneasy sense of mortality and the fleeting nature of life.