Tag: TV Eye

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Public Circuit Shares Twinkling and Percussive “To The Grave”

Although they formed back in 2023, rising New York-based electronic music trio Public Circuit — Ethan Beaumont (vocals), Sean Holloway (drums) and Nelson Fisher (electronics) — exploded into the scene with last year’s full-length debut, Lamb, which they supported with sold-out shows across 30 states, including a run of the domestic festival circuit with sets at New Colossus Festival, Hopscotch and MACROCK. Building upon a growing profile, the trio’s highly anticipated sophomore album Modern Church is slated for a September 12, 2025 release through à La Carte Records.

Modern Church reportedly sees the New York-based trio dismantling and reassembling post-punk with surgical precision. The pretense of retro revivalism is swapped out for something much sharper, darker — and entirely their own. Sonically rooted in the trio’s newfound sense of collaboration between each other, the album’s material features angular electronic instrumentation and raw percussive rhythms bathed with the high gloss ache of sophsitipop.

Thematically, the material is overtly religious. But it’s used as an analogically tool to explore sexual identity, the fleeting faith of society and the illicit repercussions of unresolved trauma. And much like its immediate predecessor, the new album continues a run of material deeply influenced by New York’s constant feed of noise and relentless energy.

Modern Church‘s second and latest single “To The Grave” sees the rising New York trio pairing twinkling synths with relentlessly driving rhythmic pulse in a way that reminds me a bit of Information Society’s “What’s On Your Mind (Pure Energy)” and Violator-era Depeche Mode while rooted in a deeply neurotic and unresolved tension — and a deep seated fear to live in one’s truth.

“Life is frail – Many people live a life where they never fully resolve trauma, hatred, etc., and, therefore, take it to the grave with them,” the members of Public Circuit explain. “Whether it be childhood trauma, gender expression / exploration, or failed romances; this song is inspired by moments left unresolved or, otherwise, unspoken.”

Shot on grainy VHS by Nara Avakian and edited by the band’s Ethan Biamont, the accompanying video for “To The Grave” follows the members of the band as they dig a grave and then bury a body in the woods — a secret that has to be kept until death.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Sex Week Shares Brooding and Lynchian “Lone Wolf”

Brooklyn-based indie duo Sex Week — collaborative and romantic partners Richard Orofino and Pearl Amanda Dickson — can trace their origins back to 2022: Orofino, a prolific musician and producer since he was in grade school, feel in love with Dickson’s taste through a wildly eclectic playlist she made for his roommate. Orofino excelled at, “honing structural strangeness into something more recognizable,” as he put it. And Dickson’s precocious perspective and natural appetite for the stranger corners of music was an uncannily natural fit.

Their innate creative chemistry led to the whirlwind writing and recording of their self-titled, debut EP, which received praise from Rolling Stone, PAPER Magazine, Nylon Magazine, Paste Magazine, Consequence and a lengthy list of others.

The Brooklyn duo’s recently announced new EP Upper Mezzanine is slated for an August 1, 2025 release through Grand Jury Music. “The approach for Upper Mezzanine felt more inquisitive,” Sex Week’s Pearl Amanda Dickson says. Where the music of their debut felt like momentary glimpses of something scary and exciting, the EP reportedly feels far more visceral, each track a focused punch delivered directly from the gut. “I still want people to be singing along and taking the melodies away with them, but the darkness of the EP is obviously there,” Dickson says. “The world is scary right now. I’m scared in lots of ways, and I think that omnipresent feeling definitely snuck into Upper Mezzanine.” 

The duo’s DIY ethos sees them firmly dedicated to helming multiple aspects of each release, including designing the art and making music videos themselves. But the EP sees Dickson learning to use her novel songwriting approach as a sort of superpower. “It’s not second nature to me yet,” she says. “So I’m always wanting to do more and be more involved than I have the capability to. And somehow at the same time, I still have the gusto to say ‘no that’s not it’ or ‘yes, that’s it.'”

The EP also sees Orofino continuing to harness his ability to make the alien feel somehow universal. “I feel it stretched me out wide creating these songs with peal and it just made me feel excited and hopeful that things can be weird and also totally accessible if you allow yourself to just be open.”

Upper Mezzanine‘s latest single “Lone Wolf,” is a brooding and eerily atmospheric tune that simultaneously channels David Lynch soundtracks and Me Moan and Carnation-era Daughn Gibson with the song featuring swirling, spectral harmonies, reverb-soaked twangy guitar. The duo’s individual verses capture an uneasily tense relationship at the brink.

The duo explain that “‘Lone Wolf’ is about communication and testing the limits of a relationship.” The accompanying self-directed video for the new single is fittingly a Lynchian fever dream.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: CIVIC Shares Jangling and Nihilistic “The Fool”

Since their formation back in 2017, Melbourne-based punks CIVIC — Jim McCullough (vocals), Roland Hlvaka (bass), Lewis Hodgson (guitar) and their newest member Eli Sthapit (drums) — have developed a reputation for reimagining the reckless intensity of proto-punk for our era of seemingly unending and unceasing uncertainty and strife. 

The acclaimed Aussie outfit’s forthcoming third album, the Kirin J. Callinan-produced Chrome Dipped saw its official release today through ATO Records. Eager to step beyond the raw, unmistakably Australian punk rock sound of their first two albums, Chrome Dipped sees the band pushing into uncharted sonic terrain without scarfing the long-held fierce energy that has defined them. 

Thematically, the album touches upon loss and grief, following the death of Jim McCullough’s mother, as well as broader essentially reflection. In a larger sense, Chrome Dipped is about casting off old shells — both musically and emotionally — and finding meaning in the messiness of human life and evolution.

The band tapped Aussie singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Kirin J. Callinan to produce Chrome Dipped. It was his idea to spend a week recording at Hobart, Tasmania‘s Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), a far cry from the outback house in which the band laid down 2023’s Taken By Force. “We’ve always done our records DIY,” CIVIC’s Jim McCullough says. “This time we wanted to step up and make it sound as big as we could.”

“We kind of stuck to the rules a little bit earlier on like, do Australian punk rock properly and all that,” CIVIC’s Lewis Hodgson says. “But after touring around the world and seeing what all these other bands are up to it’s like, you can really do whatever the fuck you want. And so it’s fun to just kind of let go.”  He continues, “I hope people feel a little confused at first. Then a bit angry, and then feel good, and then interested, and then they feel like, ‘Oh, this is sick.’ That process exactly. I hope it’s a bit challenging.”

CIVIC also brought on a filmmaker to capture behind-the-scenes and in-studio footage, with plans for a longer documentary in the works. The film explores the physical and emotional place that inspired Chrome Dipped,  following the band through their journey of making the album. 

Last month, I wrote about album single “The Hogg,” a song named for its “disgusting sounding riff.” Fittingly, the song is a bruising ripper, anchored around a grimy, chugging riff and thunderous drumming paired with McCullough’s punchy delivery. While continuing to channel the grime, filth and fury of their previous work, “The Hogg” showcases a band pairing delicate and dreamy lyrical imagery with sinister, deeply unpleasant overtones and a subtle yet slick, studio polish.

As the band explained to Flood Magazine, the song is about “staring into the abyss and seeing nothing but its pure beauty. Surface level pleasure with sinister undertones. A porcelain dancer draped in flesh, pirouetting to the infinite beat. ‘The Hogg’ is my reality. ‘The Hogg’ is my destiny.” 

“The Fool,” Chrome Dipped‘s final pre-release single is a jangling and metallic, cretinous stomp of song that showcases the band’s melodic sensibility while retaining the punchy and feisty punk quality they’ve been known for. The Aussie quartet say “‘The Fool’ is a nihilistic death march about dreamers and idiots. A jangley [sic] punk song meant to provoke the senses. It recalls the story of the fool and what’s behind the 1000-yard stare.

Directed by Conor Mercury, the accompanying video for “The Fool” is a lush yet brooding and cinematically shot visual that’s set in a world that’s both harsh yet surreal, as we see struggling and desperate folks with odd, somewhat unnecessary super powers.

CIVIC is currently in the middle of a North American tour that includes a June 13, 2025 stop at TV Eye before heading to the UK and European Union. Check out the rest of the tour dates below. Tickets are available here. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: CIVIC Shares Bruising “The Hogg”

Since their formation back in 2017, Melbourne-based punks CIVIC — Jim McCullough (vocals), Roland Hlvaka (bass), Lewis Hodgson (guitar) and their newest member Eli Sthapit (drums) — have developed a reputation for reimagining the reckless intensity of proto-punk for our era of seemingly unending and unceasing uncertainty and strife.

The acclaimed Aussie outfit’s forthcoming third album, the Kirin J. Callinan-produced Chrome Dipped is slated for a May 30. 2025 release through ATO Records. Eager to step beyond the raw, unmistakably Australian punk rock sound of their first two albums, Chrome Dipped reportedly sees the band pushing into uncharted sonic terrain without scarfing the long-held fierce energy that has defined them.

The band tapped Aussie singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Kirin J. Callinan to produce Chrome Dipped. And it was his idea to spend a week recording at Hobart, Tasmania‘s Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), a far cry from the outback house in which the band laid down 2023’s Taken By Force. “We’ve always done our records DIY,” CIVIC’s Jim McCullough says. “This time we wanted to step up and make it sound as big as we could.”

“We kind of stuck to the rules a little bit earlier on like, do Australian punk rock properly and all that,” CIVIC’s Lewis Hodgson says. “But after touring around the world and seeing what all these other bands are up to it’s like, you can really do whatever the fuck you want. And so it’s fun to just kind of let go.”  He continues, “I hope people feel a little confused at first. Then a bit angry, and then feel good, and then interested, and then they feel like, ‘Oh, this is sick.’ That process exactly. I hope it’s a bit challenging.”

CIVIC also brought on a filmmaker to capture behind-the-scenes and in-studio footage, with plans for a longer documentary in the works. The film explores the physical and emotional place that inspired Chrome Dipped,  following the band through their journey of making the album. 

Chrome Dipped‘s second and latest single “The Hogg” which is named for its “disgusting sounding riff,” is a bruising ripper anchored around a grimy, chugging riff and thunderous drumming paired with McCullough’s punchy delivery. While continuing to channel the grime, filth and fury of their previous releases, “The Hogg” showcases a band pairing delicate lyrical imagery with sinister, deeply unpleasant overtones with a subtle studio polish.

As the band explained to Flood Magazine, the song is about “staring into the abyss and seeing nothing but its pure beauty. Surface level pleasure with sinister undertones. A porcelain dancer draped in flesh, pirouetting to the infinite beat. ‘The Hogg’ is my reality. ‘The Hogg’ is my destiny.”

Directed by Marcus Coblyn, the accompanying video for “The Hogg” features a young woman in a dinner, sitting in front of a table full of breakfast foods while on her phone and texting. In a series of trippy sequences, we see a waiter come by with another full plate of something, the woman get up to dance and we see her becoming messy with her food.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Los Angeles’ Faetooth Shares a Slow-Burning and Grungy Ripper

Led by Jenna Garcia (vocals, bass), Los Angeles-based outfit Faetooth specializes in a sound that they’ve dubbed “fairy-doom:” a unique and eclectic amalgamation of doom metal paired with vocals that alternate between spellbinding melodies to guttural shrieks and howls.

The Los Angeles-based outfit’s latest single “Death of Day” is a slow-burning and forceful dirge anchored around a classic grunge structure – quiet verses featuring swirling shoegazer guitar textures and thunderous drumming and loud choruses and hooks featuring enormous power chords and banshee-like wailing serving as a brooding bed for Garcia’s sonorous croon. While channeling the likes of Tool, JOVM mainstays Slumbering Sun and others, “Death of Day” the song as the band’s Jenna Garcia explains “came to be after reading into the deity, Lilith. I was initially transfixed to the myth of her spawning from the ‘dregs,’ or lowest realm of evil. I perceived that as her coming from the dirt, the earth, and having to confront a life where her very existence is viewed as malevolence, as ugliness. She is cast out into isolation from the moment she came into being. I began to view that as a strong parallel to the existence of queer and trans people in a world that is constantly trying to exterminate and diminish them.”

Faetooth’s frontperson adds that the song’s lyrics “are written as a bit of ode to the Lilith archetype, and simultaneously celebrating and lamenting her forced seclusion from society. The first verse is about her coming into being, how she can only come out at night, and then the second verse is like, yeah, you all hate me, I’m gonna bring all my friends that you also deem as a scourge on society, f*** you.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: FACS Shares Woozy and Claustrophobic “Desire Path”

Chicago-based post-punk outfit and JOVM mainstays FACS‘ sixth studio album Wish Defense is slated for a February 7, 2025 release on CD, cassette, black vinyl and a limited white vinyl variant while supplies last [pre-order] through Trouble In Mind Records. 

The album marks the return of original band member Jonathan Van Herik, who replaces longtime bassist Alianna Kalaba. Van Herik’s return to the band reportedly brings renewed vigor and a marked angularity from the Chicago-based outfit’s more recent output. While the songs still hit hard, the approach is sideways; in fact, the roles have changed since Van Herik’s original tenure and previous time with Case and Leger in Disappears. Now on bass, Van Herik was originally the band’s guitarist while Case, the band’s current guitarist, played bass. The role reversal between Case and Van Herik has reportedly helped the band’s dynamic, offering a different musical perspective than before, while revisiting the trio’s long-held collaboration with some distance and time. 

Tragically, Wish Defense is the last album engineered by Steve Albini. Two days of sessions were recorded at Electrical Audio in early May, before Albini’s untimely death. Renowned engineer and friend Sanford Parker stepped in to finish the session 24 hours later, tracking the last bits of vocals and overdubs. Longtime collaborator John Congleton mixed the album’s material as Albini would have, in Electrical Audio’s A Room, off the tape, using Albini’s notes about the session. 

Thematically, the album focuses on the centuries old subject of the duality of man. Who is your “true self” and what do they want? The album sees the band taking a good long look in the mirror to face themselves. As the band’s Brian Case explains, the album’s lyrical content revolves about doppelgängers or doubles, tackling the idea of facing yourself and observing your ideas and motivations. 

Last month, I wrote about Wish Defense‘s first single, album title track “Wish Defense.” Anchored around an angular and forceful bass line from Van Herik, forceful and off-kilter rhythmic patterns from Leger and Case’s squiggling and chiming guitar lines, “Wish Defense” features what arguably is one of Case’s more melodic vocal turns in some time and a slow-burning, noisy coda.

Fittingly, the song continues the JOVM mainstays’ long-held reputation for writing material that’s psychologically probing with Case laying out the entire album’s theme in one stanza, asking the listener — and in turn, himself: Are your actions and emotions your true self? Or are they a performative aspect of that “other” person you put forward into the world? Case says that ultimately, the sentiment is ” . . . don’t let the bastards get you down, there’s something beyond this moment, like hope — but not in the naive belief that ultimately people are good.”

Wish Defense‘s second and latest single “Desire Path” features woozily swirling guitar textures, squiggling bursts of guitar for the song’s punchily delivered, mantra-like lyrics paired with a forcefully percussive rhythm section. The song evokes a claustrophobic sense of unease; of walls both psychological and real closing in on you.

The official visualizer/video echoes the album’s cover art with checkerboard patterns and eyes looking back at the viewer.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: S.C.A.B. Shares Expansive and Brooding “Caught My Eye”

Led by Sean Carmago (vocals guitar), Queens-based indie outfit S.C.A.B. — currently Carmago, Cory Best (guitar, backing vocals), Alec Alabado (bass, backing vocals), Evan Eubanks (drums, percussion), Jordan Rich (synth, piano, production) and Sean Brennan (cello) — will be releasing their first batch of new material in two years with the October 25, 2024 release of the five-song Rose Colored Glasses EP. 

Carmago’s lyrics see him searching for distortions and distractions from the truth, and the interplay between truth and love. And over the pat give years, the band’s work has slowly developed to reflect a worldview created from an awareness of the interplay between truth, love and illusion — and the great comedy of it all. The new EP thematically focuses on love, the uneasy nature of reality, depression, songwriting and being severely, acutely alive.

Last month, I wrote about “IDK New Reality,” a woozy,  120 Minutes-era MTV alt rock-like track track anchored around jangling and distorted guitars, a driving groove paired with rousingly anthemic hooks and Carmago’s earnest croon. 

The EP’s latest single “Caught My Eye” sees the Queens-based outfit crafting a song that synthesizes elements of shoegaze,  120 Minutes-era MTV alt rock, post punk and post-punk and contemporary pop and trap glitch anchored around Carmago’s earnest croon and the band’s penchant for remarkably catchy hooks.

The band’s Carmago offers some reference points for the new single: “Noticing your own wandering eye. Exploring shame. Asking for a lot with little in return. Sharing a song with you. Non-monogamy. Fear of being seen. Thinking about someone else. FaceTime. Unemployment.”
 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Fat Dog Shares Euphoric Trance Banger “Running”

Led by Joe Love, the rapidly rising London-based electronic act Fat Dog — Love (vocals, production), Chris Hughes (keys, synths), Ben Harris (bass), Johnny Hutchinson (drums) and Morgan Wallace (keyboards and sax) — can trace its origins back to 2021, when Love decided to form a group and take the demos he’d be making as a way to keep himself during lockdown out into the world. Initially, Love had two simple rules: Fat Dog was going to be a healthy band, who looked after themselves and there would be no saxophone presence in their music. But those two simple edicts have long-since been broken.

With Hughes, Harris, Hutchinson and Wallace, Love found like-minded mavericks to help bring the dream home. “A lot of music at the moment is very cerebral and people wonʼt dance to it,” says Hughes. “Our music is the polar opposite of thinking music.” The band’s Chris Hughes should know. He was originally a fan of the band, who at that point had been making a name for themselves with a series of exhilarating and/or wonky shows across South London before he joined.

Those early gigs formed the bedrock of what the rapidly rising British outfit were all about: seizing the moment, drinking too much with the moment, going home separately from the moment, but making up with the moment again the next day. Naturally, the rising British outfit quickly developed a following — and it helped that every show across London had become a huge upgrade on the last.

There’s something far deeper going on with the band. “Thereʼs a sense of community about Fat Dog,” says Hutchinson. And after completing their first shows in the US, including a set at a taco joint, the band has quickly built up a following Stateside. Building upon the buzz in their native UK, the Londoners will tour the UK next month and November, as well as make a run of the European festival circuit, playing sets at festivals in the UK and Europe over the summer.

Amazingly, the band’s breakthrough year or so, has come as the result of only two official singles under their collective belts: “King of the Slugs” and “All The Same,”  propulsive, club rocking, industrial-inspired banger built around glistening synth arpeggios, and orchestral sample-driven hit, industrial clang and clatter paired with skittering, tweeter and woofer rattling boom bap, enormous shout along worthy hooks and a plaintive vocal delivery.

Fat Dog’s highly-anticipated full-length debut, WOOF is slated for a September 6, 2024 release through Domino Recording Co. Produced by the band’s Love, Jimmy Ford and Jimmy Robertson, WOOF‘s material is influenced by Bicep, I.R.O.K., Kamasi Washington and the Russian experimental EDM group Little Big. Sonically, the album reportedly sees the London upstarts firmly establishing music for letting go, anchored around a blend of electro punk, snarling rock, techno soundscapes, industrial electronica and rave euphoria. The sound that Fat Dog makes, according to Love is “screaming-into-a-pillow music.” He continues, “I wanted to make something ridiculous because I was so bored. I don’t like sanitized music. Even this album is sanitized compared to what’s in my head. I thought it would sound more fucked up.”

WOOF‘s latest single “Running” is a hook-driven bit of club rocking trance, built around glistening, razor sharp synth arpeggios, relentless four-on-the-floor, thumping club beats and shouted vocals. But underpinning the club friendly euphoria is a tense, paranoid unease that befits our corporate sponsored hellscape.

Directed by Stephen Agnew, the accompanying video for “Running” is a surreal, breathtakingly cinematic visual with hints to Ken Russell, Ingmar Herman and others that reveals the true origins of the cult of Fat Dog and their real leader.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: A Place To Bury Strangers Share an Explosive Ripper

Led by Death by Audio founder and Dedstrange Records co-founder Oliver Ackermann, New York-based JOVM mainstays A Place To Bury Strangers — currently Ackermann (vocals, guitar), John Fedowitz (guitar) and Sandra Fedowitz (drums) — have long been fueled by Ackermann’s restless creativity and propensity to be surprising: Over the past close to two decades, A Place To Bury Strangers have delighted, astonished — and occasionally destroyed the eardrums of — their audience with a sound that combines elements of post-punk, noise rock, shoegaze, psychedelia and avant-garde music in rather unexpected ways. Their live show is often wildly unpredictable and often sees the band

In concert, A Place To Bury Strangers is nothing short of astounding — a shamanistic experience that bathes listeners in glorious sound, crazed left turns, transcendent vibrations, real-time experiments, brilliant breakthroughs.

And as the founder of Death By Audio, the company behind signal-scrambling stomp boxes and visionary instrument effect pedals, Ackerman has exported that sense of excitement, surprise and invention to other artists, who plug their instruments into his company’s gear and attempt to blow minds with wild, new sounds and approaches.

With A Place To Bury Strangers’ latest lineup, the band may arguably be at their most current sounding, courageous and accessible melodic in their lengthy and acclaimed run. The new lineup has two releases under their belt, 2021’s Hologram EP and their sixth full-length album, 2022’s critically applauded See Through You, which they’ve supported with a seemingly indefatigable touring schedule.

Continuing their long-held reputation for restless creativity, the members of APTBS are releasing a four 7-inch vinyl record series, called The Sevens. The Sevens are a treasure trove of previously unreleased tracks from See Through You. The special vinyl collection sees the band inviting listeners to dive deeper into their unique sonic universe to explore uncharted territories and hidden gems. “When looking back at the recordings that were done around the time of See Through You, there were a bunch of great tracks that just captured life back then and really had something incredible going on,” APTBS’ Oliver Ackermann says. “Even though they are a bit raw and a bit personal, I thought it would be a mistake if they didn’t come out. I thought it would be best to go back to my roots and put out a series of 7-inches the way A Place To Bury Strangers started. That strange weird format where the tracks each speak for themselves; no album context to muddy the water. These tracks are such a contrast to the way I am feeling now and the current songs we’ve been working on so slip back into this moment in time.”

The first installment of the series, “It Is Time”/”Change Your God” saw its digital release the other day and will see a physical release on Friday. “Change Your God,” the first single of the series is classic APTBS — bombastic, over-the-top post-punk and shoegaze sonic explosion rooted in fuzz and feedback saturated power chords, pummeling drumming and propulsive bass lines, grunge-like quieter-extremely loud-quieter song structures and Ackermann’s reverb-drenched, seemingly detached yet yearning delivery.

The accomapnying video features slickly edited stock footage of pulsating time-lapsed highway traffic and blooming flowers, of sledgehammers smashing things, jellyfish glowing in the dark, buildings imploding and more. And it’s all fucking awesome.