Formed back in 2011, Brisbane-based indie rock outfit The Valery Trails — currently, Andrew Bower (vocals, guitar), Sean Bower (bass), Dan McNaulty (drums) and longtime collaborators Screamfeeder‘s Tim Steward (guitar, vocals) and We All Want To‘s Skye Staniford (vocals) — traces their origins back to when the band’s frontman, Andrew Bower, an expatriate Aussie then residing in Houston, enlisted his brother Sean Bower and Dan McNaulty to start the band.
With the assistance of file-sharing through the internet and some occasional intercontinental travel, the trio develop da set of songs started in Andrew Bower’s home studio into the band’s full-length debut, 2012’s Ghosts and Gravity.
2014’s Buffalo Speedway and 2016’s Chameleon Bones further cemented their melodic and atmospheric rock sound while receiving college and speciality airplay in the States and critical applause from media outlets like PopMatters, The Big Takeover and many others across the globe.
Following Andrew Bower’s return to Brisbane in 2020, the band began their transition to writing in a much more conventional manner, gathering to to record 2022’s The Sky Is Blue with long-time collaborators Steward taking a more active role in the band while Staniford continued to provide backing vocals, as she has since the band’s second album. Radio airplay in several Aussie cities and an east coast tour helped to increase the band’s profile at home, while The Sky Is Blue charted on Stateside college and specialty radio.
The band’s extended lineup gathered last year to work on a set of songs, which would become the band’s forthcoming album, Winter Palace. Slated for a September 12, 2025 release, the Aussie indie rock outfit’s fifth album continues the eclectic approach of its immediate predecessor, with the material seeing the band explore synth-pop stylings, horn-driven retro flavors and some straightforward rock and roll sprinkled among the band’s long-held power pop crunch and jangle.
“Everything Is Temporary” Winter Palace‘s breakneck first single continues a remarkable run of hook-driven, crunchy, 120 Minutes-era MTV alt-rock-meets-Husker Dü -like rock. Thematically, the song leans a bit on familiar nostalgia while also viewing with a healthy and wizened suspicion of too much nostalgia. As LCD Soundsystem‘s James Murphy once sang “I wouldn’t trade one stupid decision for another five minutes of life” and maybe that’s a healthier way of looking back on things.