With the release of 2018’s full-length debut It Will Come To You, the acclaimed Vancouver-based JOVM mainstay act ACTORS — currently Jason Corbett (vocals, guitar), Shannon Hemmett (synth, vocals), Kendall Wooding (bass) and Adam Fink (drums) — found the band quickly establishing an anthemic yet brooding post-punk sound centered around icy synths, angular bass lines, squiggling guitars and Corbett’s reverb-drenched croon.
Since the release of it Will Come To You, the members of the Vancouver-based JOVM mainstays have been busy: Until the pandemic put touring on pause, the band had been on an extensive touring schedule to support the album, including at stop at the long-shuttered Brooklyn Bazaar for a headlining set at 2018’s A Murder of Crows Festival. Simultaneously, Corbett has been busy as an in-demand producer working with a number of post-punk acts including fellow JOVM mainstays Bootblacks and Ultrviolence.
Acts of Worship, ACTORS’ highly-anticipated sophomore album is slated for an October 1, 2021 release through Artoffact Records. Recorded and produced at Corbett’s Jacknife Studio, the album reportedly finds the Vancouver-based pushing their synth-driven post-punk sound in a much more dance floor friendly direction while retaining the brooding melancholy and massive hooks that have won them attention.
Late last year, I wrote about “Love U More,” a single that can trace its origins to the band being on the road: While traveling the Autobahn at 190km per hour (about 120 mph), the song’s opening synth melody looped through Jason Corbett’s head. The song itself is centered around shimmering synth arpeggios, angular and reverb-drenched bursts of guitar and a relentless motorik groove in one of the act’s more sensual songs to date. The band’s Shannon Hemmett describes the song’s atmosphere as “standing alone on a shadowy street. I see the flash of a cat’s eyes in the dark. I am hunting and hunted, recognizing that tension that lives inside me, and all of us. This track embraces the bittersweet moments of loss with the ancipatoon of new possibilities.”
“Only Lonely,” Acts of Worship‘s second and latest single is a brooding yet sensual song featuring glistening synths, a disco inspired baseline, metronomic four-on-the-floor, rousingly anthemic hooks and Corbett’s plaintive delivery expressing aching yearning and vulnerability. Arguably one of the Vancouver-based act’s most dance floor friendly songs, the song as Corbett explains is indebted to Roxy Music — in particular “The Space Between” “Dance Away” and “Love Is The Drug” come to my mind as reference points.
“‘Only Lonely’ pumps with a bass grind that harkens back to top tier Roxy Music. It finishes with a flourish of arpeggiated synths that’s the icing on the cake. Dance floor approved,” Corbett says.
The recently released video is indebted to Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers and continues a run of visuals that sees the video’s obsessed and deranged anti-heroes drive across surreal landscapes to find the members of ACTORS, brutally torture them while dancing around the room. It’s disturbing much like the source that inspired it.
The band will be embarking on a lengthy North American tour that includes an October 2, 2021 stop at Saint Vitus. Check out the rest of the tour dates below.
ACTORS “Take Your Love Tour” 2021:
Sep 9 – San Diego, CA @ Space BAR
Sep 11 – Phoenix, AZ @ Rebel Lounge
Sep 12 – Los Angeles @ Catch One Underground
Sep 13 – Oakland, CA @ Elbo Room
Sep 14 – Sacramento, CA @ The Starlet Room at Harlow’s
Sep 15 – Portland, OR @ Star Theater
Sep 16 – Tacoma, WA @ Elks Temple Spanish Ballroom
Sep 17 – Seattle, WA @ Tractor
Sep 18 – Bellingham, WA @ The Shakedown
Sep 22 – Montreal, QC @ Le Ritz
Sep 23 – Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe
Sep 24 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Spirit Lodge
Sep 25 – Detroit, MI @ Small’s
Sep 26 – Chicago, IL @ Cold Waves Festival
Sep 27 – Indianapolis, IN @ Black Circle Brewing
Sep 28 – Louisville, KY @ Art Sanctuary
Sep 29 – Cleveland, OH @ Mahall’s
Sep 30 – Baltimore, MD @ Metro Gallery
Oct 1 – Philadelphia, PA @ Warehouse on Watts
Oct 2 – Brooklyn, NY @ Saint Vitus
Oct 3 – Washington, DC @ Pie Shop
Oct 4 – Richmond, VA @ Richmond Music Hal
Oct 5 – Raleigh, NC @ The Pour House Music Hall
Oct 6 – Asheville, NC @ The Odditorium
Oct 7 – Atlanta, GA @ 529
Oct 8 – Tampa, FL @ Absolution Fest
Oct 9 – Austin, TX @ Elysium
Nov 27 – Vancouver, BC @ Rickshaw Theatre
Dec 7 – San Antonio, TX @ Sam’s
Dec 8 – Dallas, TX @ Dada
Dec 9 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Kilby
Dec 10 – Denver, CO @ HQ
