Tag: women who kick ass

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Penelope Isles Shares Shimmering “Thinking Seat”

Today, Isle-of-Man-born, Brighton-based JOVM mainstays Penelope Isles — siblings Jack and Lily Wolter — announced that they’ll be releasing their long-awaited and highly-anticipated third album, the aptly titled 3 on September 25, 2026 through Bella Union. Three years have passed since their last live show. Somewhere in between, life happened: Lily Wolters spent six months in Sri Lanka and Indonesia, stepping back from music for the first time years and spending the bulk of her time surfing. Jack Wolters hit the road as a guitarist in rising country star CMAT‘s touring band. And over the past year, Jack and Lily have released acclaimed solo album as Cuboza and My Precious Bunny respectively.

Written on a monthlong surf trip to Lagos, Portugal, 3‘s songs have sandy feet, beach hair and sunburn shoulders with shimmering hooks and aching harmonies. A year later, the band went to the Isle of Lewis off Scotland’s northwest coast to record the album live at Black Bay Studio.

Interestingly, 3 marks a couple of firsts for the JOVM mainstays: The album is the first as a true trio with their close friend Joe Taylor (drums) joining the band, and the first album that they’ve ever recorded live. Jack and Lily Wolter trade shimmering guitars and sunlit harmonies and aching falsetto ethereally floating above while Taylor’s drumming anchoring everything. While the album’s material is carefully constructed, the songs read a bit like the pages of someone’s diary ripped out and slipped under someone’s door while evoking a perfectly built sandcastle on summer vacation that’s flattened in an instant by a loved one’s passing cruelty.

Thematically, the album’s material sees the band still hopelessly obsessed with love, with heartbreak and what lingers afters, but the band carve out something entirely new: Sonically, the album is reportedly much like a shifting coastline of sound — hazy, luminous and always on the verge of collapse. Essentially, the album is the sound of the songwriting duo finding each other again. “Penny Isles is such a big part of our personalities,” Jack Wolters says. “So it was about time we got back to it.”

3‘s first single “Thinking Seat” is a sun-dappled tune that features Lily Wolter achingly tender delivery ethereally floating over shimmering, shoegazer-like textures and twinkling synths anchored by Taylor’s steady and propulsive time-keeping. Written upon reflection of the countless hours spent behind the wheel of the Wolter siblings splitter tour van, the song is s spiraling sequence of worry, heartache, planning, remembering, forgetting and then remembering again, desperately trying to hold it all together, trying to stay on track and on time, and trying to find a parking space large enough for the van. Sure, there’s a specificity that only tiring musicians and those who know touring musicians would know; but the song is rooted in a deeply universal uncertainty about your life, your place in it and what’s next that will be familiar to just about anyone.

The song features the lyric “U.G.A.K.I.,” an acronym for “You Guys Are Killing It,” a catchphrase that they coined and have used when touring felt especially difficult, dirty, absurd and flat out stupid, as a way of injecting humor and positivity in the constant uphill struggle of being a touring band in the contemporary music industry.

Directed and shot by the duo, the video pulls back the curtain for working bands, as it features the duo desperately trying to create a groundbreaking visual on a shoestring budget. While detailing the absurd difficulties of their lives as touring musicians, they do so with a sense of humor.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Yerilis Shares Gorgeous “Me Levanté”

Yerils Villamediana Hernández is a Venezuelan-born and-based singer/songwriter and musician, who performs with monoym Yerilis. She can trace the origins of her career to her childhood: She started writing her first songs when she was nine. By the time she turned 16, she joined the C.U.A.M. Choir, which strengthened her technical rigor. She complemented that with advanced training and signing under the tutelage and mentorship of Raif, the host of La Magia del Mundo Infantil y Juvenil. Hernández’s multidisciplinary background allows her to approach interpretation and stage presence with a technical precision and professionalism.

The Venezuelan artist has established a reputation as a versatile singer/songwriter, capable of bouncing between traditional Venezuelan rhythms, like the pasaje and more contemporary sounds across various styles and genres.

Her latest single “Me levanté” is a gorgeous blend of Venezuelan folk with a contemporary arrangement — in this case, a shimmering, dexterously finger plucked guitar accompanying by Hernández’s proud delivery. At its core, is a much-needed message of perseverance in difficult and uneasy times, which gives the song a timeless feel.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Lolabelle Shares Anthemic, Mosh Pit Friendly “Limb”

Buxton, ME-based indie rock band Lolabelle can trace their origins back to the summer of 2024, when three neighbors– Caroline Homer (vocals, guitar), Kurt Fedora (bass) and Gene Gill (drums) — met in their backyard and bonded over a shared love of 1990s alt rock. This meeting of the minds, bought together an unlikely pairing of musicians: Fedora has recorded with J Mascis and Dinosaur Jr., Mark Lanegan, Gooblehoof and a lengthy list of others — and is a grizzled national touring circuit veteran; Gill, is a music educator and saxophonist with a background in both classical music an jazz; and Homer, a former opera singer and late-in-life guitar player.

That casual meetup quickly became a vehicle for Homer’s songwriting and the trio would regularly sneak into the dusty, unfinished basement of their apartment building to jam. When Robert Samantha‘s and God’s Furniture‘s Stephen Bennett (lead guitar) joined the band, the quartet quickly established a sound that’s bittersweet, deeply visceral and cathartic yet fun and full of driving energy while making the rounds of the Portland, ME area live music circuit, including Blue Portland Maine, The Apohadion Theater, The Portland Club, Hey Sailor! and the Starboard Lounge, Hi-Fdelity Brewing, Fogtown Brewing Company, DIY shows and more.

The band went to the studio to record their debut EP, which is slated to drop sometime this month. The EP will be supported with a planned Northeast tour, too. In the meantime, their debut single, “Limb” is a melodic bit of indie pop that channels 90s alt-rock like Veruca Salt, Dinosaur Jr, Letters to Cleo and the like, complete with the classic, alternating quiet verses and loud hooks and fuzzy, distortion pedaled power chord-driven choruses. It’s a fun, mosh pit friendly party starter of a tune that can light up a room.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Velatine Returns with Brooding, Trip Hop-like “Playing With The Orbits”

Melbourne-based songwriter and producer Loki Lockwood is the creative mastermind behind the darkwave/goth recording project Velatine. For the bulk of Velatine’s history, Lockwood collaborated with different vocalists while crafting a unique and fresh take on the familiar and beloved darkwave/goth sound. 

Last year’s “Till Death Do We Art” saw Lockwood collaborating with Nocturna. Lockwood discovered Holly Purnell through an Instagram ad. Purnell collaborated on “Oh See Me — The Siren,” and while working on that song, she joined as the project’s full-time vocalist.

Released in April, “Whisper Park,” the first Velatine with single with Purnell as a full-time member was a change in sonic direction, showcasing a more forceful goth and doom-like direction. Their latest single, “Playing with the Orbits” is a return to form featuring Purnell’s siren-like delivery over a broodingly atmospheric and glitchy production that seemingly draws from trip hop, industrial electronica and darkwave.

Written five years ago, “Playing with the Orbits” is inspired by Bianca Devins and her unfortunate murder. As Lockwood says, “her story shook me, and if you know the story, then the lyrics reveal its underlying complexity. It’s a song about her murder, it required sensitivity in its delivery. I didn’t see her naive, she was intelligent, creative, an individual, but sadly missed that this was coming. She was exposed and became a target, A song that somehow waited for Holly to express all of this.”

“Bianca was 17 when killed by an obsessed man, who she met online. Referred to as an ‘E-girl’ by the media, she was hardly that,” Lockwood continues, In her teens she had struggled with anxiety, depression and the net had been an escape where she had bonded with others with similar struggles. She worked hard to resolve her own personal issues, finished school and planned to study psychology.

“In her case, her killer spread photos of the aftermath on social media that exploded her into ‘stardom.’ Hardly an influencer, just popular and likable online, she had about 2,000 followers on Instagram when her short life ended. Within days of her murder though, that number had risen to more than 160,000. Incel groups were the main perpetrators spreading the pictures, also sending them to family members with vile messages, such as ‘She deserved it’,”says her mother Kim Devins. “Bianca was everything they hated. She was a really smart girl, very pretty; a lot of guys liked her. She was also intuitive and aware. She recognized grooming in her online community and had helped a lot of girls get away from some dangerous situations.”

Had she got this attention when she was alive surely she would have used it to warn others, but sadly she missed the signs herself. We all crave to be liked, but like her, most of us are happy to expose ourselves to others we don’t know. Innocent normal behavior right? Well it should be, but it’s also about what happened after she was killed that triggered the song. One of the last ‘brag’ posts her killer made was ‘You’re going to have to find someone else to orbit you fuckers.’

Her murder was a carefully planned and executed affair by someone who wanted to maximize their own notoriety. His images were seen, spread and celebrated by an online community of ‘Incels,’ who called her killer ‘a legend.’

There is plenty on-line if you want to dig deeper and so no need for me to say more except read the lyrics and hear Holly’s performance, the story is there,” Lockwood explains in a statement that includes some repurposed and edited material from articles written by Anna Moore, which appeared in The Guardian.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: she’s green Returns with Gauzy “close your eyes”

Minneapolis-based outfit she’s green — Zofia Smith (vocals), Liam Armstrong (guitar), Raimes Lucas (guitar), Teddy Nordvold (guitar) and Kevin Seeback (drums) — specialize in crafting dreamy soundscapes that transport the listener to scenes of soft summer rain and fields of swaying wheat, infused with raw emotional intensity. 

Their debut EP, 2023’s Wisteria saw the band establishing an honest and exploratory songwriting process, as well as reputation for being a force in the world of sonic surrealism. They supported the EP with tours across the Midwest and East Coast with Hotline TNT, Friko, JOVM mainstays Glixen and a list of others. 

Last year, the Minneapolis-based quartet signed to New York-based Photo Finish Records, who released their Henry Stoehr-produced sophomore EP Chrysalis. The EP included  the Souvlaki-era Slowdive-like “Graze,” and the Sundays-meets-A Storm In Heaven-like “Willow.” 

Building upon a growing national profile, the Minneapolis-based outfit will be releasing their newest effort, swallowtail EP on July 10, 2026 through Photo Finish Records. The EP will feature the previously released “mettle,” a decidedly  120 Minutes-era MTV-like bit of shoegaze and dream pop, the gauzy “paper thin” and the EP’s latest single “close your eyes.”

Much like “paper thin,” “close your eyes” is a gauzy and slow-burning tune that seemingly channels Souvlaki while evoking a slow descent into deep sleep. Smith’s ethereal and yearning voice dissolves into the shimmering and swirling guitar textures, which adds to the overall vivid dream-like feel of the song.

“‘close your eyes’ is about a mysterious person who kept recurring in my dreams,” she’s green’s Zofia Smith explains. “In those dreams, we shared a life together by the ocean. Waking up and realizing they weren’t real left a lasting impression on me, leaving me wondering about our connection to our dreams, how my mind could have created this person, or if I knew them in a past life.”

Directed by Jaxon Whittington, the accompanying video for “close your eyes” is shot in a sepia-toned blue ad recreates elements of the dream that inspired the song — with a life at the sea while Smith sings directly at the viewer, and an unseen figure of her dream person.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Alewya Shares Cinematic Visual for Dancehall-like “Maktoub”

JOVM mainstay Alewya is an acclaimed London-based singer/songwriter, producer and visual artist. Her highly-anticipated full-length debut, ZERO is slated for a June 26, 2026 release through Because London Records. The album reportedly embodies years of artistic growth into an effort that’s both deeply personal and sonically expansive. But the album also marks a significant milestone, as it sees her boldly stepping into a new creative era, defined by fearless experimentation and cultural fluidity. 

ZERO will include the previously released “Night Drive,” feat. Dagmawit Ameha and “City of Symbols,” “Eshi,” the Busy Twist-produced “Selah” and its fifth and latest single “Maktoub.” Anchored around dancehall reggae riddims, skittering industrial trap triplets, “Maktoub” continues a remarkable run of genre-defying and sweaty global club music that’s expansive yet urgent, accessible yet forward-thinking and remarkably catchy. Over the song’s dancehall riddims, the JOVM mainstay’s reggae-influenced vocal sings lyrics that touch upon themes of resistance, destiny and self-determination that are fiercely feminist and defiantly pro-Black and pan-African. 

The song features a sample from legendary Ethiopian singer/songwriter Teddy Afro, which was chosen by Alewya for sentimental reasons, as several generations of Ethiopans and Eritreans have listened to him growing up, much like she did.

“Maktoub,” which derives its title from the Arabic word “it is written,” reflects ZERO‘s recurring themes of faith, instinct and roots woven throughout. Led by feeling, rather than prescribed formula, “Maktoub” showcases the JOVM mainstay’s intuitive creative process in which rhythm and emotion guide the music before lyrics. “Sometimes songs take time to reveal themselves but ‘Maktoub’ felt immediate and effortless from day one,” Alewya says.

Directed by Lee Trigg, the accompanying video for “Maktoub” was shot in Afar, Ethiopia and follows the JOVM mainstay and a crew of friends riding motorcycles across the plains — and running. The video captures Alewya as a magnetic, carefree presence.  For the video, Alewya and the local filming crew flew two hours from the nation’s capital Addis Ababa and then drove eight across the country to reach the region, camping and hiking through its volcanic landscape along the way.

Afar lies at the junction of three tectonic plates — the Arabian, Nubian and Somali — and is one of the hottest and lowest places on the planet, where temperatures regular exceed 122º F with the land sitting at 410 feet below sea level. Despite the extreme conditions, the nomadic people of Afar have developed an unparalleled knowledge of survival and a fiercely independent culture. Historically, the Afar people have resisted colonization by neighboring empires and European powers.

“Afar is where my worlds meet — where three tectonic plates converge; Arabian, Nubian, Somali,”  says Alewya. “It is the birthplace of humanity, and a land where a new ocean is forming beneath my feet. The Afar people are warriors who have lived on their own terms for centuries, and the women carry a grace that makes me feel close to God. For ‘Maktoub,’ with Teddy’s vocals blessing the track, it felt right to create from the closest place to the beginning.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tokyo Tea Room Shares Mesmerizing and Shimmering “Eyes Off You”

Last year’s full-length debut, No Rush saw the rising Margate, UK-based outfit Tokyo Tea Room quickly establishing a sound and approach that takes listeners on a journey within a tender, comfortable bubble. Their music is inspired by lived-in, human emotions while thematically exploring longing and the ephemeral nature of existence. The album eventually led to millions of monthly listeners across the DSPs and a sold-out North American tour, helping the band amass a rapidly growing global audience.

The Margate-based act have new music coming that will reportedly see them entering a new chapter that sees an evolution of their sound that remains rooted in the emotional depth that the band has begun to be known for. The rising British act will return to North America for a fall tour, supporting their new material. The tour includes two NYC area dates — October 13, 2026 at Music Hall of Williamsburg and October 14, 2026 at Bowery Ballroom. Check out the rest of the tour dates below.

In the meantime, the rising outfit’s latest single, the Daniel James Elliott-penned “Eyes Off You” is an atmospheric, mesmerizing and hook-driven, sophitispop-inspired bop that features Beth Dunn’s yearning vocal ethereally floating over shimmering synths, Nile Rodgers-like guitar and a supple yet propulsive bass line. “Eyes Off You” captures the desperation and delusion of an all-consuming obsession, describing the inability to let go, even when it hurts.

Directed by Jacek Zmarz and starring Anders Hayward, the accompanying video for “Eyes Off You” is a cinematically shot fever dream that follows Hayward as he expressively dances in series of surreal yet gorgeous locales.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Video Interview: Hush’s Paige Barlow and Miles Dupire-Gagnon

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms chats with Hush’s Paige Barlow and Miles Dupire-Gangon about their recently released “For Dolly” and more.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy 45th Birthday, Brandi Carlile!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Brandi Carlile’s 45th birthday.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy 52nd Birthday, Alanis Morisette!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Alanis Morissette’s 52nd birthday.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Black Ends Shares Bruising Nirvana-like “All I’m Bone”

Black Ends — currently Nicole Swims (vocals, guitar), Ben Swanson (bass), Karl Fagerström (drums) and Tom Scully (guitar) — is a Seattle-based band, who make music that sounds, well like Seattle: a heady mxi of gnarled and fuzzy guitar chords, gritty and slimy textures, bombastic, ear drum shattering volumes and Swims’ guttural croon paired with Swanson’s propulsive groove. They’ve dubbed the sound gunk pop, an evolution of grunge that’s filtered through a modern lens, and feels perfectly at home in our era of paranoia, unease and overstimulation.

2020’s Jack Endino-produced Stay Evil EP received praise from The Alternative and Post-Trash and more, and airplay from KEXP. Their full-length debut, 2024’s Psychotic Spew landed at #1 on Seattle Times‘ Best Washington Albums 2024 list. And since then, the Seattle-based band have shared bills with Bikini Kill, Otoboke Beaver, Shonen Knife, Skating Polly, Living Colour, English Teacher and Pretty Girls Make Graves.

2026 sees the band returning with a new lineup — Tom Scully (guitar) and Karl Fagerström (drums) — and a new single, “All I’m Bone, ” which marks Scully’s recorded debut with the band. “All I’m Bone” is a bruising Nevermind-meets-In Utereo-inspired ripper, featuring sludgy guitars, a churning groove, thunderous drumming and remarkably catchy, mosh pit friendly hooks and choruses paired with Swims’ guttural croon. While arguably being one of the more straightforward songs of their growing catalog, the song thematically is rooted in a deeply universal sensation — the creeping unease and dread of your impending mortality and the fear of what, if anything, is beyond the mortal coil.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Montréal’s DONALDA Shares Woozily Euphoric “C FOU”

Montréal-based electronic dance music duo DONALDA — Florence Lafontaine and Olivier Martin-Fréchette — derive their project’s name from the name given to the first women admitted to college in Québec in the late 19th century, and is a nod to the fictional character introduced in Claude-Henri Grignon’s 1933 novel Un homme et son péché, who, for several generations, embodied the consequences of patriarchy.

Lafontaine and Martin-Fréchette both have an academic background in digital, contemporary mixed-media and instrumental composition, as well as in jazz interpretation. Inspired by UK garage, dubstep, left field bass and other British electronic music sub-genres as well as the queer nightlife scene, the duo take a pedagogical approach to music in order to deconstruct the boundaries of musical genres. While getting people onto the dance floor is their ultimate goal, they also seek to spark musical curiosity among their audience, something that is at the core of their inclusive, unifying philosophy.

Through composition, sound design and creative coding, the Montréal-based duo tap into their wide-ranging experiences to bring every stage of DONALDA’s creative process to life. And fittingly, their versatility imbued their sound with a coherent and deeply personal artistic identity rooted in a celebration of diversity and inclusion, freedom and the French language.

The duo recently signed to Bonsound, who released their debut single “C FOU.” Meshing elements of dubstep, drum ‘n’ bass, alternative R&B and Larry Levan-era house, “C FOU” sees the duo pairing glitchy beats, broodingly atmospheric synths, soulful harmonies, catchy danceable choruses and hooks, The result is a woozy, drunken euphoric feel of freedom — but with a bit of grit, sweat and grime.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Glasgow’s Cwfen Shares Broodingly Atmospheric and Cathartic “Whispers”

Glasgow-based quartet Cwfen (pronounced coven) — Agnes Alder (vocals, rhythm guitar), Guy DeNuit (backing vocals, lead guitar), Rös Ranquinn (drums) and Mary Thomas Baker (bass) — quickly built up a reputation as one of the UK’s hottest, emerging doom bands with 2024’s “Reliks,” which won over fans and critics and landed on Kerrang‘s release of the week playlist.

Building upon a growing profile, the Scottish outfit released their Kevin Hare and band co-produced debut Sorrows last year. Recorded at Deep Storm Productions, the album’s material lives in the space around doom, where the weight of its riffs are matched by the weight in your chest, and where the lyrics and songwriting as equally as important as the music. The band specifically intends to write songs that are big on riffs but even bigger on feeling; to create songs that speak to the listener and are carried throughout their lives. Sonically, the band sees Cwfen’s Agnes Alder bearing her (proverbial) claws one minute and howling, whispering and pleading the next one, all while her and her bandmates craft arrangements that evoke a brewing storm front on the horizon, looming larger as you approach.

“We never set out to write an album. We were just four friends making music we wanted to hear. But then Sorrows emerged, and when it did, it pulled us into its orbit. We couldn’t ignore it,” Alder says.  “When we stopped trying to fit into any one space, what came out was this beautiful mix of dark and light. Something visceral and cathartic.”

The album which included long-anticipated and long-desired reworkings of “Embers” and “Bodies,” two self-recorded demos and long-time fan favorites, received unexpected and widespread acclaim from the heavy metal music press, landing on several Best of Lists last year. Since the album’s release, the Glasgow-based quartet have toured extensively with Paradise Lost and Faetooth and they’ve made runs of the UK and European festival circuit, building a growing international presence through their live performances of Sorrows‘ material.

To celebrate a breakthrough year and the anniversary of the album’s release, the rapidly rising Scottish band have released a video for “Whispers,”a broodingly atmospheric song that’s one-part A Storm in Heaven and Souvlaki-era shoegaze, one-part doom metal and showcases Alder’s remarkable vocal range, which goes from a sultry croon to a feral howl. While cathartic, the song comes from a deeply personal place, capturing a narrator in the midst of an all-consuming mix of despair and rage.

“It’s taken a while to feel comfortable releasing ‘Whispers’ as its own thing. The song itself, lyrically, came from a very personal place, in contrast to the broader themes elsewhere on the record,” Cwfen’s Alder says. “This, for me, is a song that cuts right to the bone; it might not be too obvious in the lyrics themselves, but it’s taken a year of seeing the fans respond to it, watching it become one of their favourites, to really have the courage and the confidence to give it some of the love it deserves.

“The screams weren’t planned. They weren’t on the first version, but when we went back into the studio after a few weeks, that’s what had to come out, so what you hear in this song is the depth of that feeling,” Alder adds. “It’s one of the most cathartic, tender, and ultimately visceral songs on the album, and deciding to release it now feels like the acceptance of a direction in my songwriting that I feel ready to explore on the next record.”

Filmed and edited by Amy Greenbank, the accompanying video for “Whispers” is shot in a gorgeously cinematic black and white, and juxtaposes footage of the band playing shows across Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Ireland to wrapt audiences with haunting wintry landscapes across Northern Europe, the band doing promo shoots and behind the scenes tour footage.

“We were so lucky that our Creative Scotland funding allowed us to take this tour and to bring Amy Greenbank with us,” Cwfen’s Alder says of the tour and video,. “We got to work with an incredibly talented videographer, and we made a friend for life. She’s someone who will always be part of the Cwfen family. We made incredible memories on this tour and it’s so lovely to see some of them here.’”

“Following an unexpectedly busy and wonderful 12 months since the release of Sorrows, we’re proud to share our new video for ‘Whispers,'” Cfwen’s Guy DeNuit adds. “This song has become a live favourite with the band and audiences, and we are so fortunate to have had this documented and beautifully presented by our videographer and dear friend, Amy Greenbank.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: sundayclub Shares Anthemic “Blue Wave”

Winnipeg-based indie duo sundayclub — Courtney and Nikki — have quickly cemented a sound and approach that blends hazy indie pop and dreamy textures with unfiltered storytelling. The result is material that’s much like blurry photograph, grainy yet glowing, fleeting yet full of feeling and life. 

The duo’s nine-song, self-titled, full-length debut is slated for a July 10, 2026 release through Paper Bag Records. Their debut is deeply informed by the stillness of rural Manitoba, where the duo started the band as a way of processing the very strange limbo of early adulthood — that feeling of being caught between who you once were and who you’re slowly becoming. Fittingly, the album is rooted in place: in a romanticized, re-examined Winnipeg with its hard edges softened in the way that memory often soften things. Thematically, the album touches upon growing up, growing apart and growing into your own skin. 

The album includes the previously released “Camera Shy,” and the album’s latest single “Blue Wave.” Built around a motorik pulse, fuzzy guitars and a euphoric, sing-along worthy hook and chorus, “Blue Wave” is an uptempo rousingly anthemic layered with three drum kits — and the product of over 170 vocal takes. Much like its predecessor, there’s a hauntingly bittersweet undertone to the song with the single leaning into the feeling of “pre-nostalgia,” which happens when you experience nostalgia in real time and began to feel as though you might miss the current moment before it’s passed. The song also references Courtney’s first car, a 2009 blue Pontiac Wave, lovingly named Trudy after its previous owner, and the memories Courtney and Nikki associated with the car — and with a specific period of their lives. So, in some way, the car was a bit of a time machine, and a way to explore the fuzzy and hazy spacers between the past and present.

“This song reminisces on the early days of a relationship in the midst of inner turmoil and uncertainty over what the future might hold,” Carmichael explains. “It’s about wanting to be a different, better, and more evolved version of yourself despite not being there yet, and seeking escapism in the past as a way to find solace. I felt impossibly restless at the time of writing the song and was just generally tired: tired of feeling like I wasn’t progressing, tired of being patient with the record we were making, tired of feeling vulnerable and overlooked. By looking back into the past, I could escape into a feeling of wistfulness to distract myself from how frustrated I was in the present.”

Directed by Qran Zhu, the accompanying video for “Blue Wave” was shot in Toronto and follows a young couple in love, who decided to steal two old bikes and go for a joyride. But what originally was young and mischievous whimsy turns into something much more dangerous and eventually tragic.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy Belated 45th Birthday, Victoria Legrand!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms belatedly celebrates Beach House frontwoman Victoria Legrand’s 45th birthday.