Tag: Miranda and the Beat S/T LP

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Miranda and the Beat Shares Breakneck Ripper “Manipulate Me”

Formed back in 2018 here in NYC and now based in New Orleans, the rising rock outfit Miranda and the Beat — currently Miranda Zipse (vocals, guitar), Dylan Fernandez (Farfisa) and Alvin Jackson (bass) — have been renowned for their high-energy live shows and fearless punk approach.

After extensive touring to support last year’s self-titled full-length debut, the rising rock outfit will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore album Can’t Take it on October 25, 2024 through Ernest Jenning Record Co./Khannibalism across North America and Wild Honey in Europe.

Written and recorded in a five day burst at King Khan‘s Moon Studios Rock n Roll Vortex in a remote village on the German countryside, the album sees the band blending all the best flavors from pure punk anthems played at a eardrum shattering intensity, to grinding R&B, to hypnotic, edgy sci-fi alchemy and some heartbreaking balladry too. “If you need a soundtrack to an evening of Germs burns and mind-altering mayhem followed by warm heartfelt embraces and skid marks this is the band for you,” King Khan says. “The soundtrack to the real apocalypse has arrived and is waiting for you at your favorite record store. Real Rock n’ Roll is alive and well, the torches have been passed and the Molotov cocktails are being lit and thrown. Miranda and the Beat are the wild fire you have been waiting for to light under the collective asses to destroy patriarchies, topple kingdoms, smash colonies with a bold middle stink finger in place. Be forewarned…. And come find out what ‘Earthquake Water’ is, it may one day save your life.”

Can’t Take It’s third and latest single “Manipulate Me” is a breakneck and bruising, mosh pit friendly, punk rock ripper anchored around some scorching riffs. “Manipulate Me” brings back memories of sweaty, hardcore punk shows at Coney Island High and The Continental. So play as loud as humanly possible — and then open up that pit!

“This song was probably the most fun to write for the album,” Miranda and the Beat’s Miranda Zipse says. “We were all in King Khan’s studio getting wine drunk and spitballing lines back and forth. We pretty much spent the whole time rolling on the floor dying of laughter, which ended up being very therapeutic and what we needed to do at the time. This song’s about some real shit and it felt really good to get it out of our system in the form of an absolute fuckin banger. Moral of the story: always be a weirdo but never be a manipulative creep.”

Directed by Nazar Khamis and the band, the accompanying video was filmed by the band’s Dylan Fernandez and Nazar Khamis, and edited by the band’s Miranda Zipse and Dylan Fernandez. The video begins with the band hopping the turnstiles at the Morgan Avenue L train station, and following them being badasses around Bushwick.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Miranda and the Beat Share a Feral, New Ripper

New York-based garage punks Miranda and the Beat — currently founding duo Miranda Zipse (vocals, guitar) and Kim Sollecito (drums) with Dylan Fernandez (Farfisa) and Alvin Jackson (bass) — can trace their origins back to a small California town, where the band’s founding duo met. Zipse, a high school dropout, had been working for her mom’s estate sale business going through dead people’s belongings and making up melodies in her head as she went about it to pass the time. Some of those melodies became the band’s first songs.

After playing shows locally, the duo decided to visit NYC, and during that visit, they tried their chops playing shows around town. When they’re friends, The Mystery Lights went on tour, the pair shacked up in their friends’ apartment and simply decided to never leave. The pair gave up their possession and a humdrum, everyday sort of existence in the hopes of making it as a real band.

Zipse and Sollecito shared a bed, looked for work and spent their time honing their craft. They met Dylan Fernandez when he delivered weed to a guy Zipse was dating at the duo’s apartment. Fernandez then joined the band. A years later, after Kate Gutwald’s departure, the band added Fernandez’s little brother Alvin Jackson. The band then continued to play around town, and eventually wrote what would become their highly-anticipated full-length debut. Building upon a growing profile, the New York-based garage punks opened for The King Khan and BBQ Show‘s seven-week long US and Canadian tour, also further cementing their reputation as a must-see live act.

The legendary King Khan, the self-professed “Emperor of R&B” says of the band “I never thought I would see someone be able to play guitar with the ferocity of Link Wray, and sing like Lydia Lunch had a nuclear meltdown and morphed into Etta James and Yma Sumac. Miranda and the Beat ARE the quintessential heirs to our rock n’ roll throne… May the circle remain unbroken. Consider the torch has not only been passed but its fiery tale is ready to set the whole world on fire all over again.”

Miranda and the Beat’s highly-anticipated, self-titled, full-length debut is slated for a May 26, 2023 release through Ernest Jennings Record Co./King Khang’s Khannibalism. The Nick Zinner-produced and-mixed album is reportedly a hallucinogenic ode to the canon of soul, garage punk, pure R&B and mayhem.

The album’s latest single “Concrete” is an old-fashioned sweaty, grimy and downright feral ripper built around fuzzy power chord-driven riffage, a forcefully propulsive rhythmic chug paired with Zipse’s powerhouse vocal range. Swaggering, gritty, nasty garage punk full of booze, piss and spittle ain’t dead y’all — and Ms. Zipse and company are here to get in your face and remind you of it. Play this one as loud as you can fucking stand it!

The accompanying video employs slickly edited footage from Velveeeta cheesy B horror movies, including a Roger Corman-like intro about a haunted house, some childlike drawings of ghosts and other creepy crawlies, eyeballs, a beating heart and more.