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Glassio Bares Tremendous Heart With Debut LP For the Very Last Time

Glassio’s For the Very Last Time is the kind of record that submerges you from head to toe. His debut record, the eleven songs fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, resulting in a soundscape so vivid and immense you realize something truly special is unraveling. Known for remixing songs for Madge and Goldwash, Glassio (real name Sam Rad) takes various hyper-personal threads from his life and twists them together for a concept record based around “growth and rebirth of someone’s character out of a dark space,” as he describes it. He not only has more room to play, dashing through otherworldly textures, but finds true freedom in the rediscovery process. Start to finish, the record hinges on tragic events Rad experienced in 2018, but out of the ash, he emerges as a true pop visionary.

“It became clear to me that that year was going to impact the rest of my life. Without that year, this album wouldn’t have existed at all,” he explains. “Each song started off with a melody that I thought up with a lyric already attached to it — and then I began expanding outward in terms of lyrical approach. That’s usually the method I like most; it almost feels like cooking an egg on a frying pan. I never really like to critique what that first lyric or melody may be — instead I just try my very best to be honest about what part of my life this line is referencing and embrace that fully.”

Even as he invites the listener out onto the glitter-scattered dance floor, there is an inescapable melancholy tracking just beneath. In his personal life, he was dealing with immense negativity, so he turned to “drinking more and taking long walks by myself in the middle of the night through Park Slope listening to ‘Over The Hillside’ by The Blue Nile,” he says. “That was my initial coping mechanism. I almost, in a strange way, wanted to embrace being incredibly lonely, and that album, Hats, is honestly a perfect record to do that to.”

When the year was coming to an end, Glassio opted to get sober for a bit, and that’s when early album roots took hold with a flood of melodies. “I started off 2019 feeling fresher than I had in years. Two lyrics really hit me hard out of the blue that helped me understand what this record was going to mean to me,” he remembers. Those lyrics were “I’m saving my life with white wine and 909s” (from opening song “White Wine & 909s”) and “Remember the night that you fell down the stairs at your favorite bar” (from the starry “Almost Forgot How to Play Guitar”). “I remember saying to myself, ‘This is the kind of honesty I can get behind,’” he recalls. “And that kick-started the album and helped me regain myself.”

Formerly a duo, Glassio uncovered a willingness to let things be perfectly imperfect, if the song called for it. “I mixed every song (with the exception of two) by myself. I spent most of the process working out ideas on my own — whereas when [this project] was a duo, I had my partner to confer with. I think this actually gave me more confidence to let the music live in an imperfect place from a mixing standpoint and to let the idiosyncrasies of doing everything myself give the record a defining sound,” Rad explains. “That was incredibly liberating, and I didn’t anticipate that I’d welcome that freedom so easily. Usually, I’m incredibly meticulous about a mix or arrangement and will spend months working on a song.”

When listening to For the Very Last Time — from the planetary swelling of “Summertime (Kept the Blues Away)” to the medicating “Make No Mistake” — you can’t help but be bowled over by how much heart is truly on display. Coincidentally, he was falling in love during the album’s creation, which gives these tracks an even higher voltage.

“I think that actually played a big part in me wanting to write about my past with the energy that comes out of a new relationship. I wanted to put my heart into this — almost in such a way to be loved again, to be understood,” he says. “I’ve always felt misunderstood in life, and that’s actually been my biggest motivation behind writing music. Doing so with this album meant that I was learning to trust others again. Even though this album was very much about heartbreak, I was recording it while I was falling back in love, and I think that gave the album an interesting energy. It made it both about loss and trust all at once.”

Heartache certainly informs much of the record, but a working musician’s life also lays claim elsewhere on the record. “Tie my head to the back of a limousine,” his voice bends through static on “The Government,” among his most irresistible moments. Funny enough, he doesn’t actually recall what that line, in particular, means. He offers this explanation: “I initially really just liked the imagery. I was picturing the scene in the intro of the film The King of Comedy where Robert DeNiro hijacks Jerry Lewis’ limo to try and pitch himself as an up and coming comedian.”

“One more second ‘til the government flashes/And everybody’s on the scene,” he later sings. Here, he comments on trying to make a music career work amid “a political climate that almost makes it impossible to do so for so many,” he says, “and that line may have been me mocking the life that many of us fantasized about as kids: wealth, fame, celebrity.”

The chorus, which was “peripherally inspired by frightening exchanges between Trump and Kim Jong Un back in 2017,” draws a frightening apocalyptic picture. “I wanted the song to loosely depict a friend group getting together one last time due to the threat of impending nuclear war,” he notes.

Down to the song’s blistered synths, an unease soaks the production, as he wrestles with “that voice in the back of your head that says, ‘Well, what if you’re wrong?’ or ‘Are you sure this won’t lead you down the wrong path?’” he describes, “but I was hoping to achieve that very subtly. To do that, I think I tried to employ synth sounds that mimicked what I would imagine a Fisher Price synth to sound like, if they were to exist, and would have the part play something jarring and distinct.”

Glassio plays around with similar staccato synths on songs like “Almost Forgot How To Play Guitar” and “Thunderbirds,” stylistic choices he says were greatly influenced by “It’s Raining Today” by Scott Walker and “I’m Not In Love” by 10cc. Those compositions frame “vocals and pedal tones very eerily,” he says. “It’s the type of eerie that is heavily omniscient but that you sometimes don’t realize is there. Sort of like a very unremarkable painting in the lobby of a Holiday Inn — once you notice it, you realize how bizarre it is and how off putting it is. You begin asking: ‘Who made that? Where are they now?’ I love listening to records that make me ask those questions.”

On “Guitar” – which Rad says was the quickest to write on the record – he wields vocalist Daneshevskaya’s angelic vocals as a sword, slicing and dicing through a thick downpour. “Almost forgot how to play with stars / Remain in the light that you felt on the night/When the world went dark,” she offers up a lush prayer. “Almost forgot how to play the part/Remember the things that you said on the night when you broke my heart.” She guides us through the halls of past breakups, her voice adding a bit of heft to the lyrics. Paired with ambient production, the song takes flight all on its own; Glassio finds alluring beauty in such simplicity.

“I think some of my favorite lyrics do that… simple statements that mean so much or could mean so much,” he says. “The version of me that will hear the finished album six months after it’s release definitely strives for that kind of meaningful simplicity, but I almost never achieve that if I’m forcing it during the making of the music. It just never works out.”

With “Thunderbirds,” the album closer, a slick, almost grimy darkness sprouts in both the production and lyrics. “When I’m dead I hope I’ll find/It’s easy when you fall behind/Babe you know I’m broken up for you,” he whispers. He stabs right to the heart, yet it operates as a shimmer of hope. “I think I was tapping into the idea that when you lose, you gain. You discover who you are when you are in a desperate position and the search for something untouchable shields you from loving yourself and others in the most authentic way,” he says.

“Some things can only be found once you are lost for a while. That was me in 2018,” he admits. “This song is my soul at its truest, I think.”

Death is another unexpected piece to his story. “A Million Doubts” clicks together a memoriam for his late grandmother and a bigger conversation on death itself. “I want to make you proud/Get a little bit stronger,” he pleads. “Can you show me how ‘cause I don’t know the game/I got a million doubts.” Neon-washed synths dip and bend around his voice, and the heaviness is tender but unapologetic.

“I was really young when she passed, and we were very close. I wanted this song to be the type of song you listen to to think of the people in your life no longer with you; people that may even be looking down on you and keeping you safe. I wanted to try to build off that connection,” he says of the song, which also explores “remaining spiritual and believing that you are being protected.”

“I was losing my touch with spirituality in the years prior, and this song, as well as a few others on the album, are about reconciling with my faith,” he adds.

The song, which references Celtic music traditions, was a co-write with Charles Fauna, who, Glassio says, is “like a brother to me. We’ve been close friends for years and have very similar backgrounds. We both worry about similar things and can very much sympathize with one another’s anxieties,” he says. “I know, as musicians, there is this underlying desire to prove to the people that doubted you that you were able to make something of your life. I think I was definitely tapping into that emotion a bit. We never really had a discussion about what the song meant to each of us together, but I think we both instinctively knew where we wanted to take it.”

Glassio’s For the Very Last Time races forward relentlessly, always adhering to tear-laced stories bound with celestial mixes. His ability to get you crying while dancing is bizarrely energizing. “Nobody Stayed for the DJ” shoots through the veins but provokes a deep-rooted pain in the chest. “Nobody stayed for the DJ, bless their souls/With the eyes of the world all attuned to rock and roll/Won’t you help them to understand,” he laments.

He grapples with playing shows to empty rooms and what, if anything, his art has to offer. “I wanted this album to be the first clear picture of what that bedrock is for me. I care about sustaining a career and making a living off of what I do,” he says. “That being said, I was very unhinged and honest when making this – even if my voice isn’t heard by millions, I’d still consider this record a personal success.”

For the Very Last Time clearly speaks for itself. It is rich, expressive, detailed, and viscerally moving. Glassio’s debut dares you to dance, to think, to hope, to dream, to reclaim your life. We could use plenty more pop music like this these days.

Follow Glassio on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram for ongoing updates.

PREMIERE: Brooklyn Supergroup Rhinestone Mine Campy But Heartfelt Country Aesthetic on Debut EP

René Kladzyk says she’s always been drawn to melodrama – but some of the songs she found herself writing were almost “too embarrassing” to record, at least for her more esoteric, conceptually-driven musical project Ziemba. As she developed a taste for the oft-maligned country and western genre – particularly outlaw country courtesy of Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings, or the folk-adjacent Americana of Bobbie Gentry and Townes Van Zandt – she realized that its heart-on-your-sleeve lyricism lent itself perfectly to sitting with those uncomfortable emotions. The only problem was, she was living in Brooklyn, where the prospect of finding like-minded musicians to start up a country band seemed a bit like finding needles in a haystack.

While this pitiful position could’ve inspired another lonesome country-tinged tune, Kladzyk didn’t wallow; she turned to Facebook. “[My post] was like, ‘Who wants to join my weirdo country band?!’ and all these people reached out – none of whom I actually knew, we all just had mutual friends,” she remembers. From the first practice it was clear that the sort of people who would immediately respond to a post like that – and actually follow through – did so for the sheer love of playing music, and though the lineup changed slightly from those first practices, it solidified around an unlikely group of dedicated musicians, well-known in the Brooklyn scene for their involvement in rather disparate projects. These included: Baby Birds Don’t Drink Milk alum Oscar Allen; Death By Audio’s Jay Heiselmann, who’s played in Grooms and Roya; and documentary photographer Samuel Budin. The EP also features John Bohannon (Torres, Ancient Ocean) on pedal steel, Casey Kreher on drums, and backing vocals from Jess Healy, the newest official band member.

Though Brooklyn might seem an unwelcoming place for a country band to flourish, the eclectic crew had a built-in audience. “Between our collective members, we already had kind of a musical following, so it was never as hard for us to bring out a crowd as it was for me when I was starting out with Ziemba,” says Kladzyk. “Because we have members with other active projects we’ve never played a ton. We’ve only played outside of Brooklyn once I think. We’ve never done a full tour. But within Brooklyn we’ve been able to play a lot of really cool shows over the years with really great bands. We’ve been lucky to have really great crowds who dance a lot, have fun, and rage.”

Rhinestone, in many ways, represents the growing appeal of country music well outside the genre’s typical demographic – whether that’s Kacey Musgraves’ critical acclaim, Orville Peck’s anonymous rise to indie stardom, the revelation of gender-flipping songwriting ensemble The Highwomen, crossover stars like Colbie Caillat making forays into country… the list goes on. Like Kladzyk, the members of Rhinestone were relatively late to the party, but they took that fateful Facebook post as a literal invitation.

Rhinestone · Rhinestone (the first EP)

“I had less than no interest in country music for most of my life. Right before I started high school, my family moved to Missouri, where I quickly fell in with a narrow vesica piscis of Nirvana obsessives, Lilith Fair attendees, and Toad the Wet Sprocket fans. My teenage filter regarded the slick insincerity of the exaggerated redneck accents leaking from passing pickups as a tool of the enemy,” admits guitarist Oscar Allen, who wrote the EP’s second track, “Maze of Love” and takes lead vocals on it. “Over time I realized that my beloved Roy Orbison, Breeders, and Leadbelly records hinted at an alternate history and deeper peeks behind that curtain revealed songs by Gillian Welch, Townes Van Zandt, and Neko Case more powerful than my prejudice against the label. Still, I went into that first Rhinestone practice with a bit of bemusement – I had to move to New York to finally be in a country band?!”

Healy came to classic country in the early 2000s via alt-country artists like Clem Snide. “I don’t think I would have sought out a country band to join prior to Rhinestone because I don’t identify with the idea I have of the culture of country being like, white dudes in cowboy hats kicking the tires of their Trump-stickered pickup, chewing snuff, and whining. I am not a huge fan of the shiny new country radiosound,” she says. “But Rhinestone feels more like campy traditional country – we put on costumes and personas and sing the shit out of the songs and it’s a joyful rollicking good time with some heartbreak thrown in. Rhinestone’s songs seem to extract the elements of country I like – the soulfulness and universality of heartbreak, straightforward melodies – while bringing in just enough Brooklyn weirdness to turn me on.”

Named for a film that sees Dolly Parton attempting to turn NYC cabbie Sylvester Stallone into Nashville’s next big star, the campy aesthetic is certainly integral to Rhinestone’s identity. Partly, it’s about world-building, creating an immersive experience. But beyond that, it’s pointing out an interesting irony specific to a genre that “often inhabits that space where it’s simultaneously really showy and flamboyant and campy but it’s also totally earnest and heartfelt,” Kladzyk says. “And that’s something that I really like about it. Some people think if you’re wearing sparkly or shimmery clothing then you can’t be sincere. I would be so angry at myself if I didn’t take advantage of this fashion opportunity. It’s like, why not go all the way there?”

“Very early on, René laid down a clear earnestness-over-irony mission statement and that, more than anything else, made me go all in,” Allen says. “It’s been fascinating to discover how this deceptively simple genre, with song forms older than Grimm’s Fairy Tales, holds a strange resonant complexity. You’re not solely bound to tropes and cosplay, but certain chord changes, word choices, guitar phrasing, and production moves will instantly announce themselves as unworthy.”

The four-track EP came out of an upstate recording session where the band set an album and a half’s worth of material to tape, on a machine they bought with licensing fees from a Sophie Tucker cover they recorded for FUSION TV’s Shade: Queens of NYC. “Among the songs we recorded, there’s four different songwriters and four different lead vocalists,” Kladzyk says. “Mixing and mastering the songs has been kind of a drawn out process but right now we have a whole additional album done. As Rhinestone releases more music, there’s a lot of different styles that we play even though we’re kind of framing it as country – country is a term that means a million things to different people.” Allen, for his part, refers to it as “David Lynch country.”

With an extensive playlist of references, Rhinestone hopes that their homage to music’s most misunderstood format might lead people down a rabbit hole of discovery. “If, through this project, that older-and-weirder world becomes even slightly more visible to people with the same preconceptions I used to carry, I’ll feel lucky and grateful,” says Allen. Budin, the band’s bassist, adds, “It’s solid pop music, and always has been. I hope [the EP] will inspire people to delve into the rich history of country music, which, among other things, is an integral part of the story of the American recording industry.”

Kladzyk says it’s also a transgressive history, despite its current-day association with a more conservative viewpoint. She points out that a lot of country music, particularly alt and outlaw country, was “responding to corporatized, highly commercial music and feeling resistant to that, so there’s a counterculture element that’s like, almost punk. There’s no straight lines and there’s no ideas that exist in silos. It’s all interconnected.”

“I guess I hope that Rhinestone can show others, as it has shown me, that there’s a flavor of country for everyone, and that beyond the stereotype are some deep roots to draw on and be inspired by,” says Healy, who credits joining the band with opening up her guitar-playing.

“If somebody likes Rhinestone, they should keep digging,” Kladzyk agrees. “I hope that if somebody listens to what we’ve made and likes it, that they feel motivated to deepen their relationship with the music in their life, cause it’s really fun. It’s like, a really nice way to live.”

Rhinestone’s debut EP is out tomorrow, 6/30. 100% of sales from the first week of the EP release (plus pre-sales) will be split 50/50 between Movement for Black Lives and Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center. Follow Rhinestone on Instagram for ongoing updates.

Salt Cathedral Infuse Full-Length Debut Carisma with the Magic of Colombia

Salt Cathedral is more than a name for the New York-based duo of Juli Ronderos and Nico Losada. “It’s an umbilical cord,” says Ronderos by phone. The actual Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá is an underground church, built in a salt mine about an hour outside of the duo’s shared hometown of Bogota, Colombia. “It’s our heritage, especially as someone from Bogota,” says Losada. “Kids from Bogota would go to the Salt Cathedral, the mine, and it was really awesome,” he explains. The two describe the monument, from the smell of sulfur to the darkness inside the space, as “magical.”

“Since Colombia is a Catholic country and it was a dangerous job, all the miners started doing shrines to the Virgin. We have many different virgins in Colombian culture that people pray to,” Ronderos explains. “It ended up being that the entire entrance to this mine was filled with shrines and they were religious.”

And, Losada says, Salt Cathedral is a name that reminds them of home. Ronderos and Losada left Colombia about a decade ago and met in Boston while they were students at Berklee College of Music. In 2012, they moved to New York and have been steadily making music, all the while exploring their interests and learning as they go.

On May 8, Salt Cathedral releases their debut full-length, Carisma, on Ultra Music. The dance-pop duo has been at work since 2013, having released a handful of EPs and singles, including last year’s collaboration with Big Freedia and Jarina DeMarco, “Go and Get It.” Over the years, they’ve also worked with dub legend Lee “Scratch” Perry, dancehall DJ Assassin, famed drummer Jojo Mayer and the singer Matisyahu. On Carisma, they collaborate with vocalists MC Bin Laden and duendita on the track “How Beautiful (she is).”

Losada and Ronderos say that it’s important for them to work with artists with distinct, specific sounds. “They do their thing and we do our thing,” says Losada. “We don’t want to collaborate with another producer or with somebody who sounds like Juli or writes like Juli. We want to collaborate with someone who can bring something else to the table.”

For the duo, making music together has been a long journey of self-discovery. The two have quite different musical backgrounds. Losada started playing classical guitar as a child and gravitated toward hardcore and metal in his teen years. It’s music he appreciates now more for the energy and message. “I love Minor Threat, not because of the music, but because of what it symbolizes – that freedom of being yourself,” he says.

Ronderos, on the other hand, didn’t have much exposure to music growing up. “I grew up almost without music. My parents don’t really listen to music,” she says. It wasn’t until later in her teens that Ronderos gravitated to jazz and began studying it on her own. Both ended up at Berklee College of Music. “There were a lot of great musicians around us,” says Losada. “People were practicing ten hours a day and people were taking it very seriously.”

After finishing school, they headed to New York. “It was a different kind of world,” says Ronderos. “All of our classes were about jazz composition, writing, orchestrating and improvising. We had never produced or recorded really. We started a band in college, writing our own songs. We had only done it for a year.”

Starting out in a new city, without the community of potential collaborators that they had in college, meant that they were on their own. They learned how to make electronic music and record themselves. “That was a really big transition,” Ronderos recalls. They wrote new songs. Ronderos recorded the vocals herself. Losada mixed the tunes. It took them a while, Ronderos says, to really come to understand what they were doing. “We were fearless and we started doing everything ourselves and started making it work,” adds Losada. At the same time, they were also asking themselves, “What are we trying to say? What are we trying to develop?”

Carisma, then, is an exploration of who they are, where they’ve been, and where they are now. “We went through this process of discovering that super-Latino side of us that wants to dance and move to music in an uplifting way,” says Ronderos. “This music [comes from] a period in our lives when we were exploring that.”

In the weeks leading up to the album release, though, Salt Cathedral has gone through another period of exploration. “We can’t tour so we want to write more and be active and continue to create this world that we can create because we can’t go and play,” says Losada.

“We’re taking advantage of the time and the fact that we’re very self-contained,” says Ronderos. “We can make music at home. We have our instruments and we can record.”

They’ve been working on writing their next album; additionally, they’re trying to work on a “re-imagination” of Carisma, what Ronderos calls an “isolation mix” influenced by how they’ve been experiencing music while staying at home. Says Losada, “It’s a crazy time and I feel like we’re not listening to music the way we were two or three months ago.” No matter what happens, Salt Cathedral keeps moving.

Follow Salt Cathedral on Facebook or Instagram for ongoing updates.

Jessica Louise Dye of High Waisted Details Sophomore LP Sick of Saying Sorry

As the lead singer of High Waisted, Jessica Louise Dye creates sonic psychedelic lullabies while also acting as the vision and force behind some of most innovative punk rock dance parties in New York City. An authentic space cowgirl flown down from Planet Awesome with the sole mission to save Rock ‘n’ Roll, Dye is the mastermind behind unforgettable experiences like her annual Rock n’ Roll Booze Cruise: free booze, shaky waters, and synergy only the unicorn herself could have cultivated and conjured. With strong pop sensibility and feminist ideals, High Waisted are more than a surf rock band. They’ll release their much-anticipated sophomore album, Sick of Saying Sorry, on May 22.

Of the singles from the project so far, “Boys Can’t Dance” makes use of the band’s unbridled party spirit, while “Drive” captures the surrealist emotional undertone of Planet Earth from its opening lines: “We’re looking outward/Trying to decipher the code/The past repeats/Echoes of what once was and will be/We’re both guilty of editing what could harm the world.” The project will also include “8th Amendment,” recorded in 2018 for WNYC’s 27: The Most Perfect Album release, in which artists such as Dolly Parton, Adia Victoria, Devendra Banhart, Palehound, Torres, and more each contributed songs based on a different constitutional amendment. High Waisted tackled one designed to protect incarcerated individuals from excessive fines and cruel and unusual punishment.

They just released an epic psychedelic video for their most recent single, “Modern Love,” directed by Jenni Yang & Logan Seaman. The directors met while working on Beyonce’s Made In America concert and created the High Waisted video in the midst of getting married. Yang, inspired by the quote “To love is to destroy and to be loved is to be destroyed,” created a visual story about love and power. “Jess would be the heroine in the story, not only because she looks badass on the stage, but because she represents many modern women. As her character lives a happy and love-filled life, she encounters situations where she needs to step out of her comfort zone in order to protect her love. It’s a metaphor for modern love. You can’t just live happily ever after like in the movies. There are moments in which we struggle. It’s a journey of learning to be yourself, and most importantly to be brave.”

I gave Dye a ring to discuss her anticipated sophomore album, Sick of Saying Sorry. Let’s just say her infectious charisma and charm had me playing the High Waisted musical repertoire on rotation for a week – and inspired me to practice guitar until my fingers bled.

AF: The dynamic single “Drive” that illustrates the breadth of your sound. Can you talk about your influences behind the track?

JLD: The idea came from waking up just before dawn in the passenger seat of the van on tour. Everyone silent, traveling over endless pavement as the sun slowly sets the horizon on fire. Chasing something we’ll never catch.

AF: The song echoes themes of agency, rebirth, and cyclical patterns. Was that inspired by a personal experience in a relationship – or a universal state of being?

JLD: It’s actually about the forbidden love story of the sun and the moon, obliged to never meet in order to keep the world alive.

AF: How would you describe your songwriting process?

JLD: I like to set little secret intentions within my lyrics, hoping those wishes will come true. Sometimes these premonitions become accidental realities.

AF: Can you discuss teaming up with Tad Kubler (The Hold Steady) and Arun Bali (Saves the Day), in the making of Sick of Saying Sorry?

JLD: Tad was a remarkable producer. I’ve never had anyone believe in me as a songwriter like he did. He had such empathy for the writing process. To be the recipient of that level of creative commitment is intoxicating. This album was born from scraps of paper scribbled while riding the train from Brooklyn to Manhattan at 4am. It came to life in a steamy apartment on an acoustic guitar played in my underwear because a broken radiator was blasting heat. I would walk through snow to Ludlow Street to play with Richey Rose (Wendy James, Tamaryn, Jennie Vee). We would stay up til dawn singing to each other at the top of our lungs. The music came easily. Nothing felt forced. We treated each song like a sovereign nation with its own set of rules, culture and history. The result is an album of many moods. We were lucky to have Arun lend his talents to mix. He had such a fresh perspective and patience when our ears were tired. Sometimes in order to discover what we liked, we had to first figure out what we didn’t. Mark Buzzard (The Format) has been nothing but a cheerleader as I started my own music career. I was so proud to share these creations with him and honored to have him play keys. I love that everyone left their mark on this record.

AF: When did the moment hit you that fronting a rock band was your calling?

JLD: Sitting behind a screen, fresh from a break-up, at the only 9 to 5 I’ve ever worked (lasted 8 months) while I was still living out of my ’99 Buick Century. It was the only future plan that gave me a will to live.

AF: In a world with no limits to magical realism, you have to go undercover for a spy mission and can only choose one disguise to carry out a secret mission: Disco Glitter Queen, Space Cowgirl, or Candy Raver Rocker – which would it be?

JLD: This is a no-brainer – Space Cowgirl, every time.

Follow High Waisted on Facebook for ongoing updates.

Anya Baghina Explores Non-Linear Stages of Grief with “To Be Alone”

With her last four singles, Brooklyn-based songwriter Anya Baghina (also of Soviet Girls) has uncoiled an intimate vignette into the past three years of her life. The songs encapsulate a time period characterized by grief, longing, change, and growth and are capped off with her recent video for the song “To Be Alone.” While Baghina’s music walks us through her journey with mourning and isolation, she manages to make her deeply personal experiences universally relatable, as though each story she tells can be molded to fit whatever trials the listener is currently going through.

The rest have been released via Bandcamp as stand-alone singles over the last year. Each is appropriately coupled with a photograph of her late mother, who passed away in January 2017. Baghina explains that the songs were written in the wake of her mother’s passing and evolved in meaning over time. “At the moment when I really needed to let them out, I wrote them,” says Baghina. “Then I sat on them a little bit and when I re-approached them I was able to finish them.” Although chronicling the emotional aftermath of a tragic loss is an undoubtedly painful and sometimes impossible process, Baghina says that revisiting these songs after a bit of time gave her a chance to reflect on her growth.

She remembers the day that she finished writing her latest single, “To Be Alone.” “It felt kind of special because it was almost a year after,” explains Baghina. “I remember feeling sad that I still felt this way, the lyrics were still very relevant, but I did acknowledge that there was some progress made in dealing with grief.” The song is an especially poignant portrait of wading through debilitating loss and depression.

“How are you doing, are you lonesome? / Did you forget to eat today?” Baghina asks herself in the opening lines of “To Be Alone,” devastatingly depicting a depressive internal dialogue. But while some of the questions Baghina poses in the song are hard to hear, she explains that they can be a segue into healing. “I think whenever you find yourself really alone with your thoughts, it can be a really scary thing. But it doesn’t have to be if you can start to process them,” Baghina says.

And that’s exactly what Baghina’s music does – heal. She recorded one of the songs in the basement of The Forge, an artist residency she founded in Detroit before moving to NYC, and the other three in Soviet Girls bandmate Devin Poisson’s bedroom, with just one take for each. That gave these songs a directness and honesty that almost forces the listener to look within. In fact, finishing and recording this body of work has been an integral part of Baghina’s own healing process. “Performing and working on them now comes from a very different place,” explains Baghina. “Before, I think these songs would put me back into that state of general depression and bring up feelings that I couldn’t yet handle. So yeah, when I approach them now it’s from a healing perspective.”

Part of this healing process was finding a way to stay connected to her mother in the wake of her absence. Baghina explains that the photos that accompany the songs aren’t solely an homage to her mom, but a way to tie together both of their lived experiences. “I inherited these photo albums and some of the more special ones include photographs of my mother when she was young and lived in the Soviet Union,” Baghina says. “She has a pretty powerful story about growing up in a small village and going to Moscow to study in a university and eventually moving to the US. I think during the Soviet era it was especially difficult to find your freedom and your voice and I think she represents a lot of that for me. So these photographs really belong with these songs.”

Baghina, who was born in Moscow and lived there until age ten, says that her roots have heavily influenced her simplistic and direct style of songwriting. She explains the importance of folk songs in Russian culture, songs that almost everyone she knew could sing every word of. “I think a lot of my song composition does come from that, how there’s a lot of repetition… that way that once you hear the melody you can start to sing along,” Baghina muses. She couples her infectious, folk song-inspired melodies with the romantically tragic darkness found in some of her Russian influences including authors Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and rock band Lumen to create her own brand of nostalgic melancholia.

“To Be Alone” finds Baghina in the same place as almost everybody else in the entire world right now: alone and continuously navigating the non-linear stages of grief. The video, recorded during this international quarantine, eerily mirrors the cyclical routine that many people have built around their new-found solitude – bed, outdoors, bathroom, couch, repeat. Baghina’s candidly universal lyrics and soothing voice reminds us now, more than ever, that we’re never really alone.

Follow Anya Baghina on Facebook for ongoing updates.

PREMIERE: Cate Von Csoke Celebrates Beauty and Danger With “Dream Around”

Desert sun stretching over miles and miles of open space, not a soul in sight. With COVID-19 on the mind, it’s imagery that might conjure up thoughts of Mad Max or Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. But when Australian-native, Brooklyn-based songwriter Cate Von Csoke wrote her new single “Dream Around,” she didn’t have apocalyptic visions in mind. The single is a hazy, psychedelic interlude that conjures up visions of lovers entwined in the back seat of a car; the rest of the journey on hold for a moment.

“There’s a look in your eyes tonight / And it’s written all over your smile / I’ve been walking on dandelions / All I wanna do is dream around,” Von Csoke’s voice echos pleasantly. The repetition and reverb of traditional psych music are alive and well within the track, but there’s a refreshing subtlety in Von Csoke’s approach that reveals itself upon a repeat listens. Her upcoming LP Almoon, due out June 5th, is billed as a journey in “western noir.” Von Csoke, the desert’s answer to Lana Del Rey, dressed in all white, is delightfully mercurial in her promo pictures. The style is familiar, the music nostalgic, a much-needed dalliance with a simpler time.

Listen to AudioFemme’s exclusive stream of “Dream Around” and read our full interview with Cate Von Coske below.

CATE VON CSOKE · Dream Around

AF: You’re originally from Australia and you currently live in Brooklyn. Would you say your sound is mostly influenced by your home country?

CVC: The desertscapes of both the US and Australia as well as the urban landscape of New York are all constant influences on my sound. However, I believe even if you aren’t mindful of a particular landscape or experience, you are taking it all in with the chance these moments will reappear in a dream or a sound unknowingly.

AF: When did you start writing music? And what was the first song you wrote that made you go: Okay, I should really do this?

CVC: I grew up in a family of musicians so it’s hard to recall a time when we weren’t “writing.” The first song I can clearly remember (perhaps because I sang it on the bus as a painfully shy 11-year-old) was coincidentally called “Dreams Come True.” Writing has always been a means of escapism and feels more like a necessity than a desire to achieve something. Moving to New York was certainly pivotal though and is an amazing source of inspiration and a place where dreams really do come true.

AF: You worked with Jared Artaud of The Vacant Lots and Grammy award-winner Ted Young on your upcoming album Almoon. What was the recording process like?

CVC: I met Jared at a Slowdive show in New York and then played a show at a night he curates in New York called Damage Control. After the show he told me he would produce my album. Ted Young was there too and offered to engineer. They have worked on all The Vacant Lots albums together over the years as well as with many musical greats individually. All that experience and the relationship between them is extremely evident and valuable. We recorded at Sonic Youth Studio and were blessed to have Steve Shelley on drums and percussion. It was an incredibly inspiring experience and I believe we created something beautifully unique.

AF: Tell us about “Dream Around” – did this song start with a lyric, a memory, a place in your mind?

CVC: “Dream Around” is a celebration of the beauty and danger of dreams. It began with the line “I’ve been walking on dandelions…” romantic or crushing.

AF: The video for your debut single “Coyote Cry” was super dreamy. Do you spend a good amount of time curating a look to go along with your sound?

CVC: Thank you. I was fortunate to work with two dear friends, Nicole Steriovski and Jenna Saraco of Either And Studio on the music video. Their work embraces a subconscious reveal, the line between fiction and reality often blurred and up for interpretation. The aesthetic is genuine to an aspect of who I am as a person. We all play many characters in our lives, but the mysterious has always been something I’m attracted to as I’m often accused of being “off with the spirits.”

AF: In a few short words, tell us what we can expect from the album.

CVC: Almoon is a psychedelic, minimal-for-maximum effect eight-track offering of introspective anti-love songs, anchored by dark, hypnotic vocals and intriguing lyricism to not reveal, but hint at, the beauty and secrets of life.

Follow Cate Von Csoke on Facebook for ongoing updates.

Painted Zeros Return With Quarantine-Inspired “Break” Video

Painted Zeros, the indie-pop project of Brooklyn-based artist and sound engineer Katie Lau, is known for songs full of witty sarcasm and biting social commentary. “Commuter Rage” rails against men who demand emotional labor from women, while “This American Life” paints a grim picture of the empty-feeling lives many live. One tool much of Lau’s music employs is contrast: between angry lyrics and happy-go-lucky melodies; between wholesome-sounding titles and dark subject matter.

Their latest video, for the single “Break,” is no exception, with a series of outdoor images that resemble a nature documentary accompanying lyrics expressing Lau’s feelings of hopelessness in the wake of several breakups.

Lau captured the footage on her iPhone through her window while she was quarantined in her apartment. “Experiencing the natural world primarily through these narrow window-views is a phenomenon particular to NYC and to quarantining, and it can perhaps be seen as an analogue to the kind of introverted depression that inspired the song in the first place,” she says.

Lau started making music using Garage Band when she was a teenager in White Plains, NY. “Growing up in the punk scene was formative for me, and I embraced the ethos of DIY/DIT (do-it-together): the belief in community over corporatism, but also the belief in self-reliance, which was particularly important to me as a queer woman making music,” she says. “I wanted to hear more narratives like my own in an overwhelmingly male-dominated world.”

She became a full-time sound engineer after college, and in 2014, she started Painted Zeros — a name inspired by the Sonic Youth lyric, “He acts the hero / We paint a zero on his hand.” She explains the moniker: “I was attracted to the idea of a painted zero representing defiance, a rejection of power structures.”

“Break” is off Lau’s second full length album, When You Found Forever, out May 29 on Don Giovanni Records. The album also deals with recovery from alcohol and substance abuse, toxic relationships, and self-destructive tendencies. To Lau, the record’s two sides represent the journeys through these difficult times, and ultimately past them. It’s her first full-length since 2015’s Floriography.

“When You Found Forever acts in some ways as a document of the past three years of my life,” she explains. “I kind of crashed and burned around the end of 2016/beginning of 2017 and hit this dark rock bottom. Thanks to the help of so many incredible, patient friends and loved ones, I was lucky enough to get into recovery, and through ongoing spiritual and emotional growth, have entered into a period of my life with more hopefulness and love and levity than ever before.”

Lau’s music has historically blurred much of her vocals in the vein of shoegaze and ’90s screamo. “When I mixed Floriography, my first full-length, I thought in particular of one of my favorite bands from when I was a teenager, Saetia, whose music really requires you to read the lyrics to understand what they are saying,” she explains. “Their lyrics were interesting, and it was so surprising to me when I learned what the vocalist was saying — it felt like I had unlocked a second, deeper layer of meaning and engagement with their songs. I don’t think that mix choice was working for my own music, though.” For her new album, she made a conscious effort to make the vocals louder and more audible. “I don’t want to hide my words,” she says. “I want to connect with people.”

Follow Painted Zeros on Facebook for ongoing updates.

PREMIERE: Razor Braids Promote Pastel-Hued Positivity with “Nashville” Video

When life gives Hollye Bynum lemons, she makes lemonade. Her tart-yet-sweet rock band Razor Braids is all the proof you need; it didn’t really come together until a minor head injury sidelined the operatically-trained singer, forcing a recovery slow enough she had time to teach herself to play bass. Not long after, the current lineup began to solidify: first came guitarists Janie Peacock (a friend of Bynum’s old flame) and Jilly Karande (who jokes she joined the band “accidentally”), with drummer Hannah Nichols taking a seat behind the kit after her short-lived band Space Bitch shared a stage with Razor Braids at Punk Island. The quartet has played dozens of shows in Brooklyn venues, but hadn’t put anything to tape until recently, when they released their debut single “Nashville” on pink cassette with b-side “I Am.”

Now, Bynum and her crew find themselves with a pile of lemons again, as the Corona quarantine squashed everything they’d planned to promote “Nashville” – the release show at Baby’s All Right, the weekender tour, the dream of recording follow-up singles, shooting a glam video in dreamy upstate digs. But not even a pandemic could put a stop to their momentum; Razor Braids kept going. They turned their release show into a full-day event, where each member got to show off aspects of what they bring to the band: Bynum did a makeup tutorial; Peacock, who designs all the band’s posters and merch, drew personalized pictures for fans; Karande played covers that put her lovely back-up vocals front and center; Nichols, who’s a master barber by day, offered much-needed DIY haircut tips. And now, there’s a video for “Nashville” too. It may not be what Razor Braids had dreamed of – filmed over Zoom due to social distancing and edited in iMovie, it’s not exactly big budget – but it’s still silly, sexy, and ultra-endearing, a distracting little gem of a daydream, just like the song itself.

“It was tough to be so close to something that was exciting and that we had planned [but] we got right down to business once we knew everything was not gonna happen,” Bynum says. “I still wanted to honor the song and the hard work that we had put into it and I still wanted people to hear it – actually more so than before. I wanted it to provide some sort of sweet escape or momentary calm or fun or whatever the case may be.” Bynum built her “Nashville” lyrics from a series of sentimental vignettes, fleeting moments with a lover cropping up across each verse like over-exposed party-goers caught in Polaroid flashes. In her honeyed croon, Bynum confesses she “could live forever in that moment” when playing music, talking shit, and smoking weed with a crush leads to a spontaneous kiss.

The video, though, is more about the love and admiration Razor Braids have for each other. If you haven’t dressed up for a Zoom dance party with your besties to blow off a little steam, what have you even been doing in lockdown? The band employs the same monochromatic pastel outfit scheme they’ve been known to sport on stage (sort of like Powerpuff Girls playing really good rock music). Their aesthetic, they all agree, is an important component of Razor Braids, even if it’s mostly meant to up their entertainment value. “It’s feminine and nostalgic but also contemporary,” Bynum explains. Certainly, it’s hard to feel bummed when confronted with daisies, roller blades, glitter, and a candy-colored palette that would make Lisa Frank proud, but it’s the music itself that feels truly mollifying.

“The context of now has kind of enhanced the message and the meaning behind the song,” Peacock says. “It was already a feel good song before all of this happened. You listen to the song and reminisce. It’s a good distraction from what’s going on and a great way to feel like you’re a part of something, so it was interesting releasing it during this time.”

Karande says they often start off their shows with “Nashville,” because it helps the band find their groove. “‘Nashville’ is just one of those songs that feels like home base for all of us. It’s something that sets a tone – upbeat and positive and a fun way to introduce us that feels good to play live.”

Developing their songs in a live setting has given the band confidence to re-approach them, too, with a newfound collaborative spirit, one Nichols says she truly appreciates. “It’s hard to be creative if you don’t feel comfortable, like you can’t open up to the people you’re playing with,” she says. “Having been in several bands and seeing what works and what doesn’t, I feel like being in Razor Braids is a really nice balance of feeling like I have the freedom to write my own drum parts and express myself and also have plenty of material to work with.”

“When things are right, they flow,” Hollye adds. “It felt like something was kind of unlocked within myself by being with this group of women. Songwriting comes more easily to me. Playing my instrument, seeing things in a different way.”

For now, Razor Braids are doing what they can to preserve that magic long-distance, until it’s safe to return to some sense of normalcy, or at least their practice space. “We’ve been trying to capture that energy and positivity and just kind of meet the world where it’s at right now, trying our hand with recording stuff individually and seeing if we can piece together some little demos and things – just kind of figuring it out and trying to do it with excitement and energy,” Karande says. “That, I think, is very emblematic of who Razor Braids is.”

Follow Razor Braids on Facebook for ongoing updates.

PREMIERE: Zoë Moss Claps Back at Music Industry Sexism with “The Operator”

“You move with a motive / But you can’t have control / Miss me if you don’t got a check / Don’t got time for you or your lack of respect,” grunge-pop artist Zoë Moss sings in her debut single, “The Operator.” The song appears on her debut EP, Stories, which comes out later this year, and serves as Moss’s reclamation of the sexism she’s experienced while working in the music industry.

“My household growing up was very agendered — we didn’t really think about gender roles in a traditional sense — so when I got into the world, I was a young, driven person getting into the music industry,” she recalls. “I had a rude awakening to the fact that the first thing society sees about me is that I’m a feminine female. The connotations of that are things I’ve been pushing and pulling with.”

Moss is inspired by artists like Madonna and Prince who presented themselves in both feminine and masculine ways. “The Operator” in particular is about her taking up space and having pride in who she is, especially when someone’s trying to bring her down. “When I am put in a box, I always want to push myself to find a way to surprise the listener, so that’s a bit of how I came into writing ‘The Operator,'” she says.

Another song on the EP, “The Mood,” is about the subtle sexism Moss experienced during a meeting with a publisher. “I thought he was understanding me and getting my perspective,” she remembers. “Then my manager had a followup meeting with him, and the only feedback he had was, ‘She needed to be more excited. She wasn’t excited enough.'”

Moss describes Stories as “a memoir of seven songs” with an overarching theme around gender and sexuality; she sings about love, heartbreak, and being pansexual. “All of these things explore human connection and the lifestyle of a songwriter or an artist in Brookyn,” she says.

As a songwriter, Moss has written for artists including Andy Grammer and Tate Mcrae. In addition, she sang on three songs from Grace VanderWaal’s last album. She found herself among very few female songwriters — one study found that only around 12 percent of songwriters were female from 2012-2018 — something that she hopes to see change, not just for women but for LBGT people and other marginalized groups as well.

“It’s more about putting less emphasis on female vs. male and just gender in general,” she says. “It’s about just being inclusive with perspective, whether it be a man, a woman, someone who’s non-binary, whatever their sexuality is, however they present themselves — it’s just about bringing in perspectives different from the norm.” She sees this happening more and more, with LGBT artists like Sam Smith, Halsey, and Troye Sivan gaining more attention, and thinks it will only continue, as people want to see something new.

“It’s another reason I call the EP Stories,” she adds. “There are so many different stories out there, so many things that aren’t covered enough, and when they are covered, people eat it up because it’s different and it’s fresh.”

Follow Zoë Moss on Facebook for ongoing updates.

PREMIERE: Mima Good Teases Debut LP With “Sad Club Night” Single

We’ve been following Mima Good, the alter-ego of NYC-based anti-pop songwriter Raechel Rosen, from the start, covering her debut Good Girl EP and last year’s one-off track “Holly Golightly.” She returns to the ever-evolving project with single “Sad Club Night,” off her imminent full-length debut Hydra.

Rosen describes her Mima Good character as a “dramatized version” of herself: braver, more performative, more extroverted and aggressive. “I think she’s the woman I dreamt of becoming when I was a child,” Rosen admits. This dramatization allows for a narrative arc to Rosen’s songwriting; when we met Mima Good on the Good Girl EP, she was emerging from the ashes of an abusive relationship. Rosen says that letting go of that baggage “clear[ed] space for me to face more universal demons” – no longer is she getting over one boy, one toxic relationship. Now she’s taking on the entire system that subjugates women as less than, but with a higher BPM and a greater sense of apocalyptic doom: “more Trinity from The Matrix than Powerpuff Girl,” she describes.

She wrote “Sad Club Night” last year after a night out that felt particularly apocalyptic. “I felt like we were all dancing waiting for the world to end,” she remembers. Layered under wobble bass, Rosen’s vocals sound almost playful as she recounts a late night dancing with friends, “beautiful people covered in black garments and red eyeliner that made them look kind of ill.” The visceral imagery led her to consider the aestheticization of depression, how we’re living in a society so devastating that we perform our despair almost as a trend. This becomes all the more relevant as we collectively face the present circumstances, how we no longer even have the release of a night out with loved ones.

The new album itself is named for an ancient monster, a “10-song quest inspired by the story of Hercules versus Hydra.” In the myth, Hercules tries to defeat Hydra by chopping off its head, only to have two more grow in its place. Things grow more dire each day now it seems, as overwhelming as Hydra’s many heads, but Rosen emphasizes the importance of taking it one day at a time. Though she’s pausing preparations for the tour she had planned for the fall in light of current uncertainty, she’s still writing music and practicing her craft. “My mental health struggles are not really unique to me, [but] in my album at least, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I wrote victory into the game.”

Follow Mima Good on Facebook for ongoing updates.

Avery Leigh’s Night Palace Pairs Opera and Dream Pop on Debut Single

At times like these when it feels like the world is ending, one of the few purely escapist activities we have left is getting lost in music. Avery Leigh’s Night Palace gives us that on “Into the Wake, Mystified,” a lushly arranged meditation on the “gossamer thread that connects us to certain people in our lives forever.” Avery Leigh Draut, songwriter and lead vocalist, explains that the song took many shapes and sounds before settling on the final piece, released on March 10th. The evolution of the band’s first single more or less mirrors the shifting tides of Draut’s own path in music, from classically trained opera singer to frontwoman of a shimmery alt-pop ensemble, to whatever comes next.

Growing up the daughter of two service industry professionals turned business-world parents, Draut hesitated to consider music as a viable career path. Though she and her father would perform in musicals together and singing was always a huge part of her life, she saw it as more of a hobby than a way to earn a living. But when she was applying to universities, her parents surprised her by encouraging her to follow a less conventional path. “I had this chat with my parents and they were like, you love this and you should try to do this,” says Draut. “Their transparency with me about their long time struggles with making ends meet before I was born prepared me and helped me to understand I would need to create a piece-meal, gig-centric way of making a living, with (hopefully) many small sources of income that are (whenever possible) related to my creative endeavors.”

Armed with that knowledge, Draut auditioned last minute for a few music programs and was accepted to the Hugh Hodgson School of Music at the University of Georgia. She recalls her first lesson in the classically-oriented program: when one of her professors asked her what she liked to sing, she told him of her affinity for musical theatre and jazz. He responded, “No – we’re gonna sing opera.” Luckily, opera proved to be just as enticing to Draut. “I loved it. I totally fell in love with the nuance,” she explains. “Obviously there’s nuance in all music, in so many different ways, but classical music is the most challenging that I have experienced.”

Draut describes the next few years as a means to find her way creatively. After realizing that double majoring in theatre and music was next to impossible, she tabled her love for musical theatre for the moment and exercised her voice through opera. While she loved performing, there was a part of her that always wanted to write music as well, but it was at war with another part that told her she couldn’t. “I always wanted to write my own things, but kind of didn’t really think of it as an option. I was like, ‘other people do that,’” explains Draut. “So, it was kind of just figuring out that that’s not true and all art is for everybody and you can try to do anything.”

After graduating, Draut felt disenchanted by some aspects of the classical music business and found herself in a moment where she wasn’t petrified by the thought of writing a song. Thus, the early iterations of Avery Leigh’s Night Palace were created. She collaborated with musicians she met through the scene in Athens and took years to land on the dreamy, crystallized sound heard on “Into the Wake, Mystified.” “This song has been through a million different lives as you can imagine, existing for four years,” says Draut. “I wrote all of the structures, chords and melodies for the song on this electric organ I had in my living room in Athens called the Magic Genie.”

Draut transformed the stripped-down organ-and-vocals arrangement to a bubbly, orchestral tune filled out with elegantly simple string and woodwind parts, written by Draut herself. Though she views her operatic life and the Night Palace project as two separate worlds, Draut thinks her tendency to seek sweeping arrangements comes from her love of opera and its grand accompanying orchestras. “There’s such lush writing in opera and these huge orchestras and that is so magical and beautiful and I would love to incorporate [that],” Draut says. “I think there are a thousand different directions I’m going at all times with this project, but they’re all closely related and will sound like they make sense.”

Since starting Avery Leigh’s Night Palace, Draut has relocated to Brooklyn, where she works part-time as a production coordinator for the Met Opera and has sung backups on shows for musicians such as Jo Lampert (tUnE-yArDs), Kadhja Bonet, and Eric Bachmann. She travels between New York and Athens, where her band is still located and where she’s currently waiting out the pandemic with her boyfriend and the Magic Genie that astoundingly found its way back to her.

“This organ was living with me in Athens, then when I moved to New York, I moved it into my boyfriend’s house at the time, so it lived in Athens. Then he and I broke up and I didn’t know what happened to the organ,” Draut recounts. “I came back to Athens to visit and went to my friends house and it was sitting there. It turned out that my ex had given it to a friend who had given it to this guy. He was moving, so my boyfriend and I moved it into his apartment in Athens which is where I am right now, with the goats in the yard.”

Avery Leigh’s Night Palace will release more music later this year, and presumably, Draut will brush the dust off her old friend, Magic Genie, in the meantime.

Follow Avery Leigh’s Night Palace on Instagram and Facebook for ongoing updates.

Eliza and the Organix Explore Intergenerational Trauma in “Broken Sky”

Brooklyn-based band Eliza and the Organix have a unique sound that blends funk, rock, and hints of folk and jazz. Their second album, Present Future Dreams: Part II, is set for release on May 1 and will include their new single, “Broken Sky,” which vocalist and guitarist Eliza Waldman describes as a song about intergenerational trauma.

Waldman, who has a powerful voice a bit reminiscent of Alanis Morissette, sings of disillusioned dreams in the track: “Broken sky, paper dolls / When your whole life feels too small / When the best you know becomes the worst of all.” Due to the hit musicians have taken because of the coronavirus, Waldman is encouraging listeners to support the arts and download the track on Bandcamp for $.99 or more.

We spoke to her about her music, the impact of intergenerational trauma, and what having a female-fronted band means to her.

AF: Tell me about how your band got started.

EW: The band started originally at Vassar College in 2011. Me and my friends Kristen Tivey and Vanora Estridge were all in the jazz program, which was a mostly male program at a college that was historically all-female until the 1960s. That was, to say the least, a disappointing dynamic. So, immediately part of the band landscape for us was wanting to create a place for ourselves that felt more comfortable to improvise and explore what we could DO making music, and we found that with each other.

At the time, I was listening to a lot of the bands Cake and Morphine, and I was in love with the saxophone. I was really getting into textures, horn arrangements, all the layering that Cake would do on their albums. The saxophone really appealed to me because it’s like a musical gut punch. It’s a very forward instrument, and I found that aggressive energy very appealing. I was also really into Amanda Palmer and the Dresden Dolls at the time, which attracted me for a lot of the same reasons. She was loud, she was angry, she had a lot to say.

I had just really started writing songs in college – for years before that, I was very focused on classical guitar and did not really think of myself as a songwriter. But it started to come together part-way through college, and I realized, Oh hey, actually, I’m pretty good at this and I love doing it.

So it started out with me on guitar, Kristen on saxophone, and Vanora on keys jamming with a lovely drummer Erik Snow. When we started out, it was all super new, and our sound was very raw. Funk-punk energy is how I would describe it. It was a mix of soul grooves and me being super loud and playing around vocally. I was just having the best time.

AF: What made you want to write about intergenerational trauma? Is it something you’ve dealt with?

EW: I’m really glad to have the opportunity to talk about this subject, because it’s something I care deeply about. I think for years I was writing about intergenerational trauma without ever knowing it. I look back on my earlier work, and I can hear it everywhere in the songs, how I was trying to process things without really knowing how to. “Broken Sky” is one of those songs where I didn’t realize what I was writing about at first, and I was listening back to it, and it suddenly clicked for me. Oh, it’s about these patterns that got passed down to me that I now find myself living out over and over.

I’ve had quite a journey over the past few years emotionally. I think that the way we’re raised affects so much in how we think about and process the world, and it’s so ingrained that it’s easy not to realize. Both of my parents had rough childhoods, and I was raised with this mentality that no one will give you anything. Don’t ask for help. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Never show emotion, never let them see you cry. And several years ago, I went through some very rough stuff involving a relationship that I found myself completely unequipped to handle emotionally. I didn’t know how to be kind to myself when I wasn’t doing well. I didn’t seem able to pull myself up by my bootstraps, and I was really hard on myself about that for a long time. I didn’t know how else to cope. I realize now that my coping mechanisms and my mindset were not letting me break free of these painful patterns.

I was lucky that I discovered therapy, and I have to say it was an incredibly liberating experience. I feel like these patterns from the past are something I may always be dealing with, but I feel much more in control of my life at this point. I learned as a child to avoid conflict, and that’s something that has been the hardest pattern for me to break free of, to actually get to a place where I believe that my thoughts and my feelings matter. I know that’s something a lot of women can identify with. But I’m in such a better place with myself at this point, and I feel incredibly lucky to be living my best life, out there making my music in the world.

AF: Do you think a lot of women are dealing with intergenerational trauma right now?

EW: I don’t know if I’m just more attuned to it than I used to be, but I feel like I see and hear women dealing with trauma pretty much everywhere recently in the arts and media. I read an article a couple days ago where Reese Witherspoon was talking about how every woman on the set of Big Little Lies was dealing with some form of trauma. That really hit me. Millennials have been called the therapy generation, and I think there’s so much that’s been pressurized in our culture for so long that’s finally starting to come out. There’s been a cultural shift where things that used to be seen as normal, women are starting to say, “No, actually, this isn’t normal, this isn’t acceptable.”

AF: What would you say the rest of your album is about?

EW: This album is actually rather high concept! It’s a two-parter. The first half of it came out in 2017 and was called Present Future Dreams: Part I. And now, in 2020, finally, Present Future Dreams: Part II is coming out. The artwork was done in collaboration with my good friends Nick Cohen and Marlee Newman and features a rubber chicken under a car tire, the concept being that for millennials in their 20s, you are this rubber chicken out there on the highway of life getting run over and bouncing back and run over and bouncing back. There’s so much learning and processing that’s going into finding your place in the world, and sometimes learning experiences can be brutal, so there’s a kind of dark humor to it. But the chicken always bounces back and tries again, so it’s hopeful, too. The songs are really a series of vignettes about those experiences of growing up in your 20s.

AF: You’ve played at a few different women’s music festivals — what’s that like coming together with other female musicians like that?

EW: It feels really great! I’ve met so many really talented, badass human beings through festivals like Womxn Fuck Shit Up DC, Swan Day CT, and Ladybug Festival in DE. I really appreciate those festival organizers for putting in all the time and energy it takes to create these amazing spaces where we can come together and nurture each other. It’s such a special experience.

AF: What do you have coming up next?

EW: Our local NY release show for the new EP is happening May 1 at Pianos with our friends HARD NIPS and Sarah FM, and then we’ll be performing at Froggy Daze Festival in Narrowsburg, NY May 15th. April 24th we’ll be in Somerville, MA at the Jungle and April 25th, we’ll be appearing on WECS FM (Eastern Connecticut State University) and playing at Gaiafest in Southbridge, MA with some NYC locals Basic B-tches. We’re also planning out some dates for our summer tour, so we’ll be doing some traveling in July, those dates TBA!

Parlor Walls Juxtapose Beauty and Horror with Video for “Game”

Parlor Walls photo by Michelle LoBianco.

Post-punk darlings Parlor Walls weave a deadly spell in their latest music video for “Game.” The initial drone, followed by an unnerving pulse of a beep, reminiscent to a heartbeat on a hospital monitor, is almost as unnerving as the video itself. It comes from the band’s most recent LP, Heavy Tongue, released in February.

The Brooklyn-based duo comprised of Alyse Lamb and Chris Mulligan utilize an element of surprise in their videos, as well as in their multi-layered live performances showcasing Lamb’s electric guitar and Mulligan’s synth-savvy. The way they build each song in a live setting amounts to a slow boil, adding each new element slowly: first synth, then drums, guitar, and finally Lamb’s eerie vocals, laying out the vision in full.

“Game” has a similar trajectory, beginning with glitchy colors, bubbles floating up from the dark, settling on a woman’s masked face looming above a bathroom floor. It’s the repetition of those initial heartbeats that pull the listener in, the odd angles which make it difficult to see whether there is one woman or two, and then suddenly seeing both women, in early 1900s bathing suits. laughingly repeating the chorus into the frame. In that split second of a frame, we see they are beautiful to the eye, but what lengths did they to go to in order to achieve perfection? The song questions what beauty is, who defines it, and asks whether we can pull ourselves away long enough to make a difference.

Read our interview with the band and watch an exclusive premiere of “Game” below.

AF: Why do you make music? To feel something or to say something?

CM: Definitely to feel something. I’m sure Alyse is different as she is certainly saying something with her lyrics, but for me music is about expressing something you don’t know how to put into words. It’s like when you go outside at night and it’s warm and the smell of the wind gives you this overwhelming visceral reaction. You feel connected to something in a gut way. There’s no anxieties in that moment, time stretches out and goes silent. You feel present and have total perspective that we are in space right now but it is okay and not scary. Like I said, it’s a feeling I don’t know how to put into words without sounding like a 14-year-old stoner. But yeah, I hope to get to a point where I can make something and it gives someone that kind of reaction.

AL: I make music to process what is going on in the world around me – it helps me like a filter. It also builds connection. Connecting with one another is soooo important to me – it’s imperative for any attempt at harmony and understanding. I also just looove the physical aspect of playing as well – it shakes me up.

AF: When did you start writing music? And what was your first song about?

AL: I got a Casio keyboard when I was seven. I played around on that thing every day. My mom had a seamstress/costume shop in our basement and my first song was about her being in the dungeon weeping with the spiders. It was a sweet little tune with dark lyrics. Clearly I was watching a lot of Conan The Destroyer and Nightmare on Elm Street (shout out Freddy Krueger). In middle school/high school I would write a lot about my relationships, stresses and insecurities. I’ve always needed it.

AF: The band has gone through just a couple lineup changes over time. How have you and Chris’s musical relationship changed over the years? Do you write in a similar way to when you first started?

AL: When Chris and I first started playing music, it was very loud and very fast. We were exercising some demons. Eventually we settled on a mostly atonal, discordant landscape with sweet melodies hovering above. I love playing with harshness and softness and mixing it up. It has been a beautiful journey to examine all these little cracks and flows, and sort of let the tide take us where it wants. We keep digging deeper and deeper and uncovering new sounds.

AF: There’s a beautiful tension to your live performances, especially as you each settle into your instruments at the start of a song. Do you improvise at all during your concerts?

AL: Yes! We love improvising live. It keeps us on our toes, and it lets us read the room before going into our set. We always improvise transitions between songs too – it’s such a treat to hear what Chris has up his sleeve for the night.

AF: Your Instagram has a glitchy, 1970s LSD symposium vibe to it. How do visual arts play into your music? Are there certain fine artists you identify with as inspiration for Parlor Walls?

CM: Don’t know if this is considered fine art, but we’ve been obsessed with Triadisches Ballet by Oskar Schlemmer. It’s otherworldly and extremely simplistic at the same time. Better than any pop song.

AL: We are both visual artists so yes, it’s a large part of our process in Parlor Walls. Our album art, music videos, live visuals, merch… everything is connected. Chris found a bunch of amazing public domain footage from the 1950s and ’60s, very blown out and campy, and this has influenced some of our art for Heavy Tongue. I’m very much inspired by Dorothea Tanning, Egon Schiele, Kandinsky, Hen Douglass, and the composer Erik Satie.

AF: Tell us about the music video for “Game.” What’s the narrative here (or is there one)?

AL: The song is about my frustration/disgust with certain people in the spotlight pushing and pedaling toxic ideas and products to young people. It is unfathomable how some celebrities use their voice and platform for money and profit rather than making this world a better place. This directly ties in with body image – we are taught from a young age that we are not enough. There’s always something being pedaled to us to make us prettier or more beautiful (Jameela Jamil is deeply inspirational to me, she has been a frontline soldier in this fight!). I stumbled upon an article about Helena Rubinstein’s Glamour Factory of the 1930s. Women went to absurd lengths in the name of “beauty.” The video for “Game” reflects the grotesque and bizarre. I wanted it to feel like being trapped inside a horror house. I’ve co-directed a number of videos but this was my first solo directing project. Chris edited it, Emma McDonald shot it, and my co-star was Andrya Ambro (Check out her band Gold Dime). Chris and I run an art collective/production company called Famous Swords. This is our latest visual project.

AF: What music are you currently listening to purely for pleasure?

CM: Resavoir. That’s the band name and album name. It gives me that feeling I was rambling about in that first answer.

AL: Too Free’s new album is wonderful. They’re a group from DC.

AF: What’s your favorite NYC spot right now?

We recently played a show at TV Eye in Ridgewood. Check it out, it’s a beautiful space!

AF: I’ve left a Parlor Walls show. I’m having a drink with friends at my local haunt. What feeling or message do you hope I’ve left with?

Shaken up. Titilated. Feathers ruffled. Inspired to create.

Parlor Walls’ latest record Heavy Tongue is out now.

PREMIERE: Stimmerman “Dentist vs Pharmacist”

Parental expectations can be fraught with peril. Some parents expect their kids to take over the family business, some envision their children as doctors or lawyers, and in some circles dwell Alex P. Keaton types whose hippie parents shudder at the thought of white collar work. “Dentist Vs Pharmacist,” the latest release from Stimmerman (aka Eva Lawitts), addresses familial pressures with a rolling guitar lick, piercing vocals, and one hell of a horn section.

A native New Yorker, Lawitts grew up attending a prestigious magnet school; it was within these corridors of rigorous practice and imaginary success that Lawitts first honed her music prowess. It gave Lawitts the distance she needed to look at her family history and question the values and assignments that were passed from generation to generation.

“You know who you’ll be / There’s a consensus: A pharmacist or a dentist / Scientific Thesis / Pick up shattered pieces / Take my sword and let it break,” Lawitts screams into the void. A veteran bass player with a history in bands that kick butt (Princess Nokia, Vagabon, Rotem Sivan, Citris), Lawitts’ forthcoming album Goofballs takes her rock persona and makes it personal. “Dentist Vs Pharmacist” offers the kind of perspective one can only garner after the youth and drugs and fear fade, leaving an angry hull that is adulthood.

Listen to AudioFemme’s exclusive stream of “Dentist Vs Pharmacist” and read our interview with Eva Lawitts below.

AF: Your Spotify page says Stimmerman is “for fans of At The Drive In, Gillian Welch, and Dirty Projectors.” How do you define the music you make?

EL: I have so much trouble defining any music at all. For a while I was calling Stimmerman progressive emo, which is not correct at all, even though it felt like it described my approach. I have this desire to be a “songwriter” (which I feel like I’m still striving towards), and to create these self-contained worlds with each song, and I also crave performing music live and in that way I want the music itself to be challenging and fun, and to provide a cathartic experience for myself and my bandmates and the audience, and I’m always trying to be more concise and honest lyrically, and all of those things have sort of coalesced into Stimmerman music, which is angular, high-energy, sadness. See? I kind of got there.

AF: You went to Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music, Art and Performing Arts. Can you give us a little inside look into what it’s really like in a performing arts school? Obviously there was much dancing in the lunch room, we assume.

EL: There was a lot of dancing in the lunchroom, haha. Not by me, but certainly by someone. My feelings about these specialized magnet schools are inseparable from the subject matter of Goofballs, although I don’t think they’re ever really directly addressed. Basically I feel like as a teenager I was extremely motivated and competitive about music (and also my teen ego was totally out of control), and so I thrived at LaGuardia, which in turn provided me with an exceptional music education. But at the same time, I feel like the culture of that kind of school can be insidious in a way – I think it discourages kids who aren’t at the top of their field by age 15 from pursuing what they love after high school (this is still my observation keeping in touch with my high school chums ten years down the line) and I also feel like that same air of discouragement is what caused a lot of my friends to sink deeper into a special kind of adolescent despair that included a lot of drug and alcohol use, and a lot of ambient self-destruction. Of course some of that is just par for the course of adolescence… there was an added benefit to LaGuardia insofar as you often had extracurricular rehearsals and such that would keep you at school till 9pm or so… so it became really easy to stay out all night and just tell your parents that you had rehearsal. That excuse combined with a student Metrocard can afford you a lot of mischief. That’s not the school’s fault, but it was, in my experience, part of the culture. I could talk about this for hours but I’ll stop here.

AF: What were you initially studying in school? An instrument or a specific kind of music?

EL: I was studying upright bass, and mostly studying, if we can speak extremely broadly, “classical” music. When I entered LaGuardia my ambition was basically to be in the MET Orchestra or something… I still play upright bass quite a bit, but the scale has tipped significantly. Throughout middle and high school and even most of college, the only time I played electric bass was in my old band Sister Helen. Now I feel like the electric bass is more a part of my voice, and certainly more aligned with the types of music I want to create.

AF: Tell us about “Dentist vs Pharmacist.” Where did this song originate?

EL: I wrote this song directly after having lunch with a friend of mine who went to middle school (Mark Twain) and high school (LaGuardia) with me, and it was directly influenced (stolen? I don’t know) by a conversation we had about this kind of half-joke about modern Russian fatalism, which was that so many of the kids we went to middle school with were raised with only two possible tracts they could follow into adulthood – they could become a dentist or they could become a pharmacist. This is the highest achievement you could possibly attain. This was the gleaming dream of our Russian and Jewish cohorts of yesteryear. We were being silly about it, but within that silliness are many real wounds about the expectations of our own parents, their parents, and an examination of how we can possibly honor the sacrifices made by our families while still attempting to function in a world that is basically incalculably different than anything they could have possibly conceived of when they made those sacrifices. Fuck! And also I just wanted to scream.

AF: You recently spoke with Street Wannabes about the struggle of co-founding Wonderpark Studios – the balance of working on other artists’ work and finding time for your own music. What does your typical day look like?

EL: Right. I run Wonderpark with Chris (Krasnow), who is also in Stimmerman doing guitar and some vocals in the live band, and he also contributed engineering, mixing and mastering to this album as well as guitar, and vocals and even some drums! Wow, just had to say it. Anyway, I think Chris is really the genius audio guy within Wonderpark. I do a fair amount of engineering and producing as well, but I handle all of the “business” of Wonderpark, meaning I spend an absurd amount of time doing our books, writing Facebook and Instagram ads, keeping up with clients, doing pre-production, meeting and haranguing new clients, and other things of that nature. So a typical day in the studio might look like coming in around 10 and helping Chris get mics on stands, making various choices regarding the session, and then spending between 8-10 hours working our butts off trying to get the best possible recording made, and trying to help people have fun doing it! Then usually an hour and a half of so of cleaning the damn studio. A typical day working from home is just a love affair with my hideous laptop and cell phone – lots of calls, lots of numbers, lots of writing. I love it but we often work 15 hour days and by the end of the “week” (which is sometimes 3 days and sometimes like 15 days) I’m usually spent.

AF: As an artist, do you keep a schedule in order to carve out creative time?

EL: I recently started keeping up with a pretty strict morning routine. Part of that routine is that I try to write a song a day, and I only give myself 15 minutes to do it. A lot of them are simply dreck, but some of them are really good! And just being in the habit of getting the juices flowing when I get up has helped the creative process overall.

AF: What’s the one piece of advice you have for a young band coming into the recording studio for the first time?

EL: Most young bands drastically underestimate how much time they’re going to need to make an album. Some bands can come in and blast out an album in one 8 hour session, but I would say 99% of them can’t. Something I would suggest is, if you’re heading into the studio for the first time – make a single! Set one full day aside and try to track one song, see how you like the process. Another mistake I see with a lot of first-time bands making is trying to set a release date before they even start recording! This is always a disaster. Wait until you have the masters of your album to set the release date! The fervor that’s created when you ignore that precious rule is maddening and it often ruins the music because you rush through the entire process and become more focused on an imaginary deadline that YOU made up instead of the music which in theory is the important part.

AF: Tell us about Invisible Planet Records. How’s it coming along?

EL: Yeah! So Invisible Planet Records is still semi-top secret, but Goofballs is coming out “on” it. Basically we’re trying to create a label component to Wonderpark and Stimmerman was the soft open. We have a couple Wonderpark bands and artists lined up to release music through us in 2020. Basically I just wanted a way to help the bands I like best do the most with their music after leaving the studio….or maybe I just wanted a way to justify all the free labor I do consulting people on how to best release the music they record with me and Chris. More about this in 2020 but for right now we’re considering it to be in beta!

AF: What art/books/music are currently moving the needle for you right now?

EL: Lately the music I’m most inspired by is the stuff made by my friends and peers and clients of the studio, and some people I’m playing with. I always thought that concept was kind of cliche but as I get older it’s just the truth. A short list of those names? Joanna Sternberg, Kat Lee/Tiny Gun, Grey McMurray, Carlos Truly, Eli Greenhoe, Rust Ring, Danielle Grubb are all people who have released music THIS YEAR that has really blown me away. As I’ve said about a thousand times, I think we’re in a weird renaissance period in NYC for weirdo rock-jazz right now and, in addition to some of the names above some of the people here that I feel like I’ve wanted to heavily steal from are Wasabi Fox, Kadawa, and Adam O’Farrill. Go check out their discographies so that when I steal from them you can call me out.

AF: We’re at a Stimmerman show. You’re about to come on. What can we expect?

EL: The house lights go down. A single spot light pierces the darkness with that familiar KA-CHUNK sound effect that we associate with a spot light turning on, even though we have no idea what the physical mechanism is. A man stands alone on stage – who is he? He stares silently into the crowd for seconds, then minutes, murmurs begin to ripple through the room. His lips tremble, a single tear rolls down his cheek. He announces that Stimmerman has been in a terrible car wreck – will they survive? The audience weeps. Bitter, bitter, merciless tears. Then! Suddenly! The door in the back on the venue whips open. I crawl, belly slithering across the floor like the snake I am, through the crowd. Using my immense upper body strength, I hoist myself onto the stage, throwing myself at the feet AND mercy of this mysterious man. He holds a microphone to my cracked and bleeding lips. “Stimmerman….forever” are the sounds that croak from my hideous throat. And the crowd agrees.

Stimmerman’s latest album Goofballs arrives this December – follow them on Facebook for ongoing updates.

REVIEW: BHuman Has Landed With Intergalactic Queer Concept LP BMovie

B movie sci-fi and horror flicks are special kinds of charmers. The Blob (1958), It Came from Outer Space (1953), Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) and War of Planets (1966), among countless others, all possess a particular aesthetic: delightfully outlandish. Certainly in the 1950s and ‘60s, such bizarre fantasies and their bloated space creatures cloaked a very real, tangible paranoia that spread like wildfire. The world was in the throes of the Cold War, and the art of cinema was vital for the collective cathartic release.

Brooklyn alt-pop duo BHuman ─ comprised of Billie Lloyd and Harrison Scott ─ excavate a smorgasbord of cosmic energies and classic b movie imagery to plot a concept record that dissects identity, self-discovery and alienation as queer folk. The aptly-titled BMovie is structured “to be almost a fictional movie soundtrack that reveals itself through the song and tracklist,” says Scott. BMovie comes on the heels of a self-titled EP released earlier this year, signaling big things for the prolific duo. The LP is raw, honest and relevant – a treasure trove of electro-pop that is unafraid to be bold and drive the narrative forward. Billie Lloyd and Harrison Scott are the kind of innovative thinkers that could be total game changers for pop music.

The effervescence fizzes right from the start ─ “Strange Things (Overture)” pops the lid with a kooky soundbite: “I saw a flying saucer…” Though the songs focus on the innate human desire to love and be loved, quirky production choices inspired by cult films and television gives every song an eerie kitsch.

On “Melt,” BHuman’s synth-filtered forms dissipate into pitter-patters of percussion and other sticky distortions that feel so peculiar its easy yo get lost in their haze. The lyrics reflect that liquid, permeable feeling; “I know that you’re scared / I feel it, too / Maybe I’ll just melt right into you,” the duo vow on one of the album’s most immediate hooks. Their boldness in composition and vocal performance is always the appropriate amount of strange and never appears so left field as to ward off potential fans. In fact, it’s their aloofness that is most compelling.

“Other Way” (soon to have its own Carrie-inspired music video) emerges with a radio-ready earworm of a chorus that cribs The X-Files theme song. Distant samples come back like lost transmissions from outerspace (“You didn’t actually believe you were the only inhabited planet in the universe?”) as Lloyd coos, “I guess what they say is true that / Things find you when you’re looking the other way.” Here, the surreal subtext elevates the relatively common pop trope of finding love in an unexpected place.

Their blip-bent version of Cher’s “Believe” is also a marvel to witness. A marching band washes in sharp waves beneath their vocals, which almost seem detached and cold, as if cast in ice, yet they remain quite evocative. In the video, Scott assumes the role of Mulder to Lloyd’s Scully (again referencing The X-Files and giving an altogether different context to the word “Believe”), as well as an intergalactic odd couple.

“Distraction,” meanwhile, is slathered with hip-hop shimmer, and its less linear melody underscores the aching mood writhing across their bedroom carpet. “Fiction” draws from a similar musical wellspring, employing handclaps and clicks to heighten its intensity, and builds upon the emotional framework. “Baby boy has got this mad ambition / But it’s all lies and contradictions,” they weep. The web of lies into which they’ve fallen becomes nearly unconquerable, but in shedding the stark truth, they wiggle free and soar into a liberating glow. “Materializations (Intermission)” is a glittering reprieve and sets the more polished tone of the second half. “I May Never Know” bounces along neon-colored synths and teases that they’ve finally come to accept heartache (“If your love is gone, I can let it be”) and embrace who they were always meant to become.

Their story comes to a crescendo on the one-two punch of “Creator (Interlude)” – which makes reference to 1953’s Glen or Glenda, starring Ed Wood (also the director), a docudrama about crossing-dressing and transsexuality – and “Teachmehowtobeyourgirl,” perhaps the set’s most vulnerable moment. Lloyd sings candidly on the pressures she experiences as a trans woman in relationships, striking a timely core: “You don’t have to be ashamed / Your love for me is not so wrong / You just weren’t raised that way.” Juxtaposed with the Ed Wood snippets, it’s easy to see why Lloyd and Scott are so drawn to tales of alien invasion hysteria; modern society still has a long way to go to fully accept those in the LGBTQ community, but BHuman confront the world that still sees them as “freaks,” destroys any and all preconceptions, and move one step closer to finally feeling comfortable in their skin.

PREMIERE: Priestess Debuts Self-Titled EP

Priestess is the haunting doom incarnation of Brooklyn-based songwriter Jackie Green. Green straddles worlds as divergent as day and night with a grace that understates her inimitable work ethic, playing music in what little spare time she has entering her second year of law school. Flanked by a new line-up of bandmates, she premieres her debut self-titled EP today on Audiofemme.

<a href="http://priestessbk.bandcamp.com/album/priestess-s-t-ep">Priestess S/T EP by PRIESTESSbk</a>

Raised upstate, Green had nearly fifteen years of classical violin training under her belt before she first picked up a guitar three years ago. She cut her teeth playing in a handful of Brooklyn bands, like Evil Daughter, while growing as a guitarist at home by writing her own songs. “I taught myself a lot about how to play guitar by writing songs that I couldn’t play yet and mastering them,” she explains. “The goal is always to be as good as Black Sabbath, but no one ever will be, including me!”

The EP articulates Green’s love of psychedelic rock and heavy metal well, though her take on these classic sounds is modern, nodding heavily towards contemporary doom metal. The looming riffs of opening instrumental track “L.V.B.” evoke the early King Woman EP Doubt, and the cadence of Green’s vocals throughout the EP, namely on lead single “Locomotive,” call to mind those of Pallbearer’s Brett Campbell.

Citing her extreme form of organization and time management, Green managed to get this EP written, recorded, and mastered while also putting together a new cast of bandmates and finishing her first year of law school. While on the surface it seems like she leads a double life, Green has come to the conclusion that she’s merely a multifaceted person. “I’ve almost kind of criticized myself, and I’ve sort of judged myself, like, you’re two-faced! Pick one! Like, who are you?” she says. “But I realized they’re really not so different, everything is still me – I like to work hard. I work hard at music, and I work hard at school, and I like to feel challenged and intellectually stimulated.”

She says this with a marked humility that minimizes such an impressive achievement, to release music she wrote on an instrument she taught herself to play not all that long ago while completing arguably one of the most difficult academic tasks one can attempt. She believes one provides an escape for the other, between the cerebral and the physical realms – a refreshing take on the balance so many young creatives struggle to achieve in their lives. This form of intentional escape is evident in the EP itself, brimming as it is with the truth and freedom of an artist fully immersed in her present moment, a few hours stolen away from a packed schedule.

Priestess celebrates the EP with a release show this coming Monday, September 16 at The Broadway. Expect to hear tracks from the EP updated and evolved by new bandmates, as well as newer material. Green hopes to take it on the road while on break from school in January, and aims to be back in the studio recording a full-length this time next year. I have no doubt she’ll pull it off.

ALBUM REVIEW: Gold Child Shines on Self-Titled Debut

Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Emily Fehler released her debut record as Gold Child last week, a moniker she adopted upon moving to New York City in 2012. A “self-proclaimed student of country music’s golden age,” she names legends Patsy Cline and Emmylou Harris as major influences, though her music itself has drawn comparisons to Angel Olsen, Mazzy Star, and Neko Case. All of these are well-deserved, as Fehler displays a mastery of the Americana sound that makes Gold Child feel classic and fresh all at once. This timelessness stems partly from Fehler’s pristine vocals, which shimmer bright above lush acoustic instrumentals, but also from the subject matter itself.

Fehler pulls the classic ’70s country sound into the present moment with her lyricism, which provides deep insight into the inner emotional world of a millennial woman, focusing on ephemeral details, evoking imagery like morning, roses, and rainbows in her kitchen. She plays with the concept of time as a theme often: its value in an age when most people work at least two jobs to make ends meet, and the modern, disconnected feeling of wishing you had more time to yourself while also wanting to share it with someone else. On track “Lose the Light,” she distills the potent visual of light coming and going as the day progresses to a metaphor for giving our time to other people each day in order to survive, concluding with the salient line “Time’s been fooling us all.”

More than once, Fehler bemoans the way her life and time no longer feel like her own, a concept that cuts to the very core of what it means to be a young person in America circa 2019. And yet, while she wishes these things still belonged to her, she implores someone else to help her get it back, opening “Lose the Light” with the plea “Take me somewhere where my time is my own.” On the aptly-named “In Between,” she acknowledges the rift between connecting with another and having to give up personal space to do so, delicately touching on the human tendency to push people away while silently wishing they’d resist us: “I might get angry sometimes but I like to feel you next to me.”

Fehler acknowledges that she wrote the album in a transitional time in her life, saying “I was coming into my own as an adult – working day jobs, trying to cope with the state of the world, and my newfound anxiety – which is maybe a culprit of why the record took so long to make.” Early single “Undertow” provides a snapshot of her trajectory: “Everything’s feeling so hectic/Been moving too fast/While I’m just standing here motionless.” But if this debut is any indication, some things shouldn’t be rushed. Fehler can finally rest assured that her time was well spent: she has managed to craft a beautiful collection of meaningful songs that will resonate with countless people, as we all drift along in a world that seems to carry on outside of our control.

PREMIERE: Beth Hansen Brings ’90s Electro Nostalgia to Late Guest At The Party with “Bend”

Brooklyn electro group Late Guest at the Party taps into the carefree, house-inspired rhythms, glistening synth lines, and instantly recognizable lyrical themes that ushered electronica into crossover pop in the ’90s – surely a golden era for club jams if ever there was one. While their sound seems to have solidified around that nostalgic inspiration, it truly took hold with the arrival of Beth Hansen – the proverbial “late guest” to the party started by three Italian dudes (Gabri, Ian, and Renzo) back in 2005. They’d released a couple of LPs with producer Caleb Shreve at the helm, but Hansen absolutely transformed the band, infusing it with earnestness and energy.

Their latest string of singles graces listeners with thoughtful hooks, catchy concepts, smooth synths, and danceable beats, and the newest of these, premiering exclusively on Audiofemme, is “Bend,” a song that combats codependent tendencies and internal intimacy issues in an infectious, danceable package. “Why do you find it so hard to be by yourself?” Beth croons in her androgynous timbre, making the track feel intimate, like an inner monologue. The pulsating beat drops out here and there but always returns, keeping things grounded and thoughtful.

“Bend” will resonate with any Brooklynite who’s found themselves raving until the sun comes up, swaying and swerving at an abandoned Bushwick warehouse, only to feel totally alone with their racing emotions as the dawn reveals the dissonance. We sat down with Beth to discuss the evolution of LGATP, the group’s songwriting style, and the inspiration behind the new single.

AF: The band has been together since 2002, Beth when did you step in as the lead singer?

BH: I stepped in late 2016 after writing “Give You A Life” with Renzo. Late Guest had started thinking about playing live again, and when he asked me to sing live for them I countered with joining them full time. I missed having a band.

AF: How did the sound evolve once you joined?

BH: Renzo and Gabriel had developed many tracks to bounce off of, and with their production and my voice, I pushed us into a more ’90s sound. I get to use a big voice and Renzo has a largely sample-based production.

AF: What does it feel like being the front person in the often male dominated genre of electro dance rock?

BH: I spent almost all of my childhood trying to find a band, and was often rejected being a young girl. It’s great now to be the loudest one in the group and I often get to bring in other women to work with us. Happily, I think fans of the band have only been excited to have me as the new vocalist.

AF: Can you discuss the origins of “Bend”?

BH: I’m still writing the insecurities of my first love despite having many longer and deeper relationships. The worries still come up. I want to make those insecurities as clear as Haddaway would when singing “What is love / Baby don’t hurt me, no more” – but I want you to get over the insecurities with me throughout the song.

AF: Late Guest At The Party resonates deeper concepts that provoke thoughtfulness and courage, while remaining playful and digestible. Can you talk about the themes you explore lyrically?

BH: I tend to explore the more bitter or cheeky thoughts that I have. They are less treated or metaphorical than many dance pop songs. “Give You a Life” is both about having depression and naively trying to push someone out of their depression. “Add It Up” is the only way I could think of yelling “I fucking love you, don’t you see?” I sometimes sneak my girlfriend’s name into the song when I sing it live. “Bevel” was me working through the feelings of being unable to directly empathize. I think it’s one of the most positive songs I have written.

AF: How would you describe your songwriting process?

BH: In general we write in small groups usually, using a started track from Renzo. “Bevel” was written with Renzo, Gabriel, Ian and I all together in one weekend. I would love to do this more. Until then, we have a studio we go to whenever possible – we all just have different schedules. I write lyrics almost everywhere. I’m usually singing out loud on a walk to the train.

AF: Who are your top three artists that have influenced your writing and performances?

BH: Lately, Jamie Principal (lyrics and melodies), Nation of Language (performance), and I’m gonna put Queen Sessi in here. We worked with her on “Bend” and honestly she really helped me to get out of a writing rut. Just seeing her run through different melody ideas effortlessly is inspiring.

PREMIERE: beccs Awakens Creative Feminine Energy with “By The Sea”

We last heard from Becca Gastfriend, a Brooklyn-based alt-soul singer who performs under the shortened eponym beccs, back in 2016, when she released her harrowing Unfound Beauty EP. The debut (and the powerful video for its lead single, “Therapy”) chronicled her struggles with an eating disorder and celebrated the ups and downs of the healing journey she had embarked on. Now, she’s back with “By the Sea,” a new single that explores coming of age themes, lustful longing, and abandonment, while meandering into hopeful escapism and finally ascending into the higher power of self love.

“By the Sea” is a huge leap for beccs, who makes her debut in music production and filmmaking with the help of co-producer Sam Mewton, guitarist Corey Leiter, and photographer/multimedia artist Katelyn Kopenhaver. “The making of the song — learning to produce, arrange, mix and make a film— made room for me to live what it was speaking about,” beccs says. ““By The Sea” became a testament to women finding out what is possible when they trust themselves and start creating with their own hands.”

I sat down with the John Lennon Songwriting finalist to discuss the inspiration behind the sonically mesmerizing, haunting ballad.

AF: Can you discuss the inspiration and meaning behind “By the Sea”?

Beccs: I feel the original intent behind the song is quite literal. It’s about someone I’m thinking of, but the song, despite its meditative cadence, takes you for a ride. By The Sea mourns the ethereal loss of someone you love as much as it discovers what lays beyond — a return to oneself. I tried to capture, through the sonic and visual direction we took, how both healing and painful this return can be.

AF: How did you connect with your collaborators? What was the creative process for the music video?

B: Katelyn and I have been collaborating for three years now in mostly photography and conceptual work but neither of us had ever made a film. We were at a diner when Katelyn popped the question, “Can you let me make your next video?” I booked our bus right then and there. We were a two-woman crew, writing, shooting, and editing our very first film start-to-finish, working around the sun in the dead of winter with one camera. It was one of the best weekends of my life. Katelyn learned final cut pro in an afternoon and it took us seven editing sessions to finish it up, our eyes and taste maturing as we went. I remember playing K “By The Sea” and seeing her cry for the first time. I’ll just say the song became as much about what Katelyn and I found together as it did about the person I speak to in the song.

Corey Leiter, a most thoughtful songwriter himself, and I had met at a show in Barcelona. I knew his tender touch on guitar was it for “By The Sea.”

Sam Mewton and I met on a Bockhaus bill. Sam had just released his EP Ensnaring (imagine a digital Perfume: Story Of A Murderer meets 28 Days Later). This dystopic soundscape could not have been more different than the demo I was about to send him. But Sam stretched my ears and gave me the space to say no. This sort of collaboration in the music studio felt invaluable to me as a female artist.

AF: Feminine agency is so important when building a body of work that feels authentically your own. Can you talk about your personal growth through the process of reclaiming your voice, and trusting your creative instincts?

B: I feel like I barely got my feet wet – excuse the pun – with “By The Sea.” It was my first stab at producing and arranging, and I can’t begin to fathom how far I have to go. At the same time, it felt monumental relative to my growth. I just never thought I could turn the knobs. I don’t think I was prepared for how much work and stillness it took to sit, listen and learn. At first glance, it’s the technical skills that feel daunting. Looking back, it was the skill of listening—to myself and my song— being patient with the answers and okay with the disappointment that made the greatest difference. It’s true how having so few female producer role models can have a significant impact on an artist. If you don’t see it, it’s hard to believe it. Marina Abramović advised artists to look out into the horizon where the water meets the sky. Observing that expanse has the power to stretch our minds to new possibilities. Luckily, I got out to the sea and had friends and collaborators nudging me back towards me. Thank you, if you’re reading this!

AF: Can you discuss the process of independently learning to produce, arrange, and make a film?

B: I think the first step is dissolving the fear, doubt, and guilt that gets in the way from learning something new, particularly in a field that is male-dominated. It took me a year or so to get past this first wrung on the ladder. I started learning guitar. Then Ableton. I enlisted some friends to give me lessons. Honestly, I had to make sticker charts for myself. It was like pulling teeth. But I did it, though it wasn’t until Katelyn and I had already made the film that I really plunged into the production on this song. Katelyn became a motivation. I didn’t want to disappoint her and I wanted to find the sonic world to match our visual one. Coming back to my cello which I hadn’t touched in years also played a big role in the actual production as did my voice and its different capabilities. I was like “if turning knobs on midi irks me, why don’t we just start with what we like?” So I just messed with my voice. It can do some WEIRD things. It’s funny… the whole thing felt like a letter to someone I love. The more specific and obsessed I got in writing that letter, the deeper I could plunge into the learning of it all. That’s probably why I made these postcards – hit me up if you want one!

AF: Your sound resonates music from generations past. If you could choose a different time period to create music in – even just for a month long residency, which era would it be?

B: I normally would say ’90s and cozy up with Paula Cole (which I’ve actually done!) and Tori Amos and my beloved Beth [Gibbons] from Portishead. But honestly, I’ve been feeling ’60s/’70s Janis Ian and Melanie hard lately. I do have to say that “Mysteries” on Beth Gibbons’ solo album Out Of Season was a big sonic inspiration for “By The Sea.”

AF: What advice do you have for women and girls out there searching to find their authentic voice and creative freedom?

B: Spend time with yourself. Embrace your boundaries. Get rid of the miscellaneous — the people-pleasing mannerisms and language we use to muddy our message, mute our power and cut ourselves short from communicating what we really want and need. Develop the skill of listening to the pit in your stomach. The one that cramps up when someone is crossing a line, when you hear a sound you don’t like around your lead vocal, when you’re about to make a decision, big or small, that disagrees with what you believe in. And take the time to become autonomous, take the time to learn. As my friend Paul says, we are always in the middle. Future you will thank you.

beccs performs live in collaboration with Little Kruta Orchestra on Wednesday, July 17 for The Hum Series with opening act Treya Lam. Purchase tickets here., and follow beccs on Instagram and Facebook for more updates.

INTERVIEW: Ziemba Extends an Invite to Parallel World of Ardis with “Veritas in Terra”

René Kladzyk has made it her artistic purpose to merge various media since the very beginning of her musical project Ziemba; her debut LP came with an incense made from flowers in and around her childhood home, and her live shows frequently feature the diffusion of scents she’s created to go along with the specific experience. Now, inspired by singing collectively with Colin Self’s XHOIR, feminist science fiction, Nabokov’s treatise on time, and the neofuturistic architecture of John Portman, Kladzyk has launched the first phase of Ardis, a high-concept three-part album that explores utopia from a human perspective.

Essentially, Ardis is a parallel version of Earth, with “necessary changes” having been made. Its creation was a direct response to Trump’s election, Kladzyk explains. “I felt really devastated by a lot of what I was seeing in America and I wanted to talk about it but in a way that didn’t just perpetuate me feeling devastated by it,” she says. “How can I talk about this in a way that’s not just dwelling on how upsetting it is, but instead thinking about possible alternatives and mobilizing in a way that’s fantastical and fun and uplifting? If you believe that cultural change is fueled by art and creative work, which I do, then people who are making work that envisions possible alternative futures can have a real material impact on the world we live in here.”

The first five songs from the LP, which comprise Part One, were released in February, along with a video for “Veritas in Terra” that brings Kladzyk’s concepts into the real world via John Portman’s architecture. His buildings have served as the inspiration for Delta City in Robocop, and appeared in sci-fi classics and recent blockbusters alike, from John Carpenter’s Escape From LA to the Divergent series. Kladzyk first encountered his work on a trip to New York City (which she now calls home) during her teens, when she ventured into the Marriott Marquis in Times Square. “Veritas in Terra” was shot in three Atlanta hotels; Portman’s architectural thumbprint is everywhere in his home city, characterized by the multi-storied arrangement of floors overlooking a towering atrium, often with a glass elevator that traverses it like a an electrical impulse running up a human spine. Indeed, this is the intended visual allusion, one which Kladzyk mirrors in relating humanity to the sprawling scale of a futuristic cityscape. “It’s an inter-scalar thing – it’s like, if you look at a building like a body, and a body like a song, you find the commonalities in the way we structure ideas to the way we structure our world on the macro level,” she explains.

The video was co-directed by Kladzyk, Megan Mack, and Allison Halter, and it wasn’t an easy shoot, considering they were forcibly removed from the Portman-designed Hyatt, Westin, and Marriott hotels. “We filmed in [the Hyatt] and almost immediately got in trouble… then I was like, okay, we have to be a little bit more careful. And then we got kicked out of another place,” she says with a laugh. “We were very cautious with the Marriott Marquis. We mostly filmed from like 4-6 in the morning. We got kicked out while shooting the last shot; I knew we would because it was right in front of the concierge desk.”

That shot became one of the opening scenes in “Veritas” – Kladzyk looks up through the atrium, wearing a bright yellow jumpsuit. Throughout the video she’s “simultaneously exploring but also a little hunted, but then also realizing that there are all these different versions of me.” She says that Portman’s buildings support an almost voyeuristic tendency that she wanted to highlight: “[The atrium] changes how you look at other humans – you can see people so far away and they look so tiny. They often aren’t aware that you’re looking at them, but you can’t help [it] because the nature of the space encourages you to look.” Overall, it was the fact that Portman’s buildings are like parallel universes unto themselves that attracted Kladzyk to his work, which has been both credited with revitalizing formerly desolate downtown areas as well as criticized for being too insular.

The two remaining segments of Ardis will appear in April and June, each with their own specific fragrance accompaniment. This March, Kladzyk begins a month-long residency at Red Hook artspace Pioneer Works, which will culminate in a musical version of Ardis on April 14. It will expand upon the excerpt she performed at MoMA Ps1 at the end of 2017, which featured herself and her sister Anna discovering, then destroying, a fragrant utopia before rebuilding it. “One of the narrative arcs [of the project] is me as a human, trying to open doorways to Ardis, failing and trying again, and in the process finding it in all these different places,” she says. The Pioneer Works performance, she adds, will feature “a number of other performers, there’ll be a large choir, and other musicians… I’m working with a really incredible set designer, and there’ll be wild costumes, but it will largely be the music interacting with visual signifiers of the world.”

Ziemba will also perform a handful of more straightfoward shows on the West Coast with Teeny Lieberson’s solo endeavor Lou Tides in the coming months, as well as some dates throughout the Mid- and Southwest. She’s performed some of the songs from Ardis in a live setting before – “Ugly Ambitious Women,” in particular, appeared on a 2015 EP, and Kladzyk says she has more material she’s interested in reimagining – and will do so again at Secret Project Robot next week. Ever prolific, she’s currently writing songs that are a little more grounded and personal, but whether she revisits Ardis in the future remains to be seen. “We’ll see what path it follows. Some of that may depend on how people respond to it, and the way that I learn from it after touring it,” she says. Though she hesitates to say that she makes therapeutic music, she does hope Ardis will offer others some catharsis, as it has for her to imagine such a place.

“[Someone asked] ‘What does Ardis look like? What’s it like there?'” recalls Kladzyk. “In short, I don’t exactly know. I’m still looking for it and I’m still learning from it. But that’s kind of the idea – maybe we need to reject this idea that we as humans can be certain, and instead focus on expansiveness, and listening and connection.”

BAND OF THE MONTH: Thelma

A guitar is only about eight pounds, but it can feel much heavier when you bear that weight on a shoulder prone to dislocation. Likewise, it’s not easy to play it with swollen and dislocated finger joints. But since she took up playing professionally, Natasha Jacobs – the force behind Brooklyn-based band Thelma – has had to deal with a constant pain that threatened her career. The band released its debut in 2017 while Jacobs studied composition at SUNY Purchase, and while demoing a second record, she began investigating her health issues in earnest. In the course of that journey, Jacobs was diagnosed with unrelated thyroid cancer, which jeopardized her singing voice, and it wasn’t until that was under control that she finally had an explanation for her pain – Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, a genetic disorder that, for her, manifests itself as loose joints and faulty connective tissues. But none of this kept Jacobs from completing her sophomore record, not only because she’s an extremely resilient person, but because, as she would attest to in the very title of the LP, out today, that making music wasn’t just a passing hobby or cold ambition. For her, it was The Only Thing she could imagine doing.

“Apart from music, it just really changed my perspective on life and what I want,” Jacobs says. “Before, I was so focused on making it as an artist, which, we all want that. But I think it really made me value love and friendship in a different way and what I want my life to be like. And also, [I started] really thinking about how you don’t have to be a successful artist to be an artist.” With The Only Thing, Jacobs has learned to be truer to her art: pursuing the pop-oriented sounds that brought her joy as a child; embracing synthesizers because they’re easier for her to “make an aggressive sound with so little effort;” and leaning in to the idiosyncrasies of her voice, which she says friends have described as that of a “primordial baby.”

“In the past I was so focused on trying to make my voice sound perfect or good or something… I realized that wasn’t really working for me,” she admits. “With this record being really symbolic for me, [I was] just trying to have fun playing music, focusing much more on being playful and emotive and just capturing the characters of the songs. I’m a pretty goofy person in general and I feel like my whole life I’ve been known as someone who makes funny voices.” She allows her voice to creak and moan and wail and whisper when the emotional thrust of the song calls for it; even on more abstract tracks like “Sway,” she oscillates between an almost operatic flutter and playful cooing delivery.

Though this way of singing is more akin to the likes of early-aughts freak folksters Joanna Newsom or CocoRosie, Jacobs is indebted to the tongue-in-cheek pop sensibilities of Lana Del Rey and Lady Gaga, too. She inhabits characters, as on “Stranger Love,” who long for the romanticized version of their crushes despite knowing the reality won’t live up to it. The lovelorn narrator of “Take Me To Orlando” is so besought with fantasy that she punctuates her verses with a sharp, breathy intake, almost like a hiccup. Even when she’s adopting these characters, Jacobs’ personality shines through – particularly her sense of humor. In the video for “Stranger Love,” Jacobs leads a geriatric water aerobics class (“That was a real swim class! They let us film it!”) as a sort of metaphor for going through the motions whilst in the throes of unrequited love.

But perhaps the most poignant moments on the record come when Jacobs confronts her health struggles. On “Never Complain,” she seeks a way to “untangle my body like a silver chain;” her voice echoes over distorted guitar, a metaphor for the distance she must cross to do something as simple as go out, “But I do it and never complain.” Jacobs isn’t feeling sorry for herself, just getting caught in a reverie that anyone with a debilitating disorder can relate to. “No Dancing Allowed” has what is perhaps one of the most poignant metaphors for living with chronic pain ever put to song: “Pain is an island with a cabaret law / Right there on the wall / No Dancing Allowed / When I’m alone with no one to enforce, I turn the music loud / My body will remind me, no dancing allowed.” Not only does it suggest her physical discomfort, but also the isolation and frustration that comes along with it.

“I don’t personally have any idol songwriters who have written much about physical pain. I can’t think of many songs that talk about it,” Jacobs notes. “And so much of the population is chronically ill or disabled – I just really hope that these songs can get to those people and help someone in some way.” Jacobs underwent surgery on her shoulder in November to help alleviate some of her pain, though she says it still feels like it’s bruised, with slow healing times being a common issue for those with EDS. She’s on thyroid medication but opted out of surgery due to the threat of vocal paralysis; she monitors it regularly and hopes that if it worsens, there will be less risky treatment options available, and the medical technology around that looks promising. “I feel like I’m still very much in the midst of what I was going through when I wrote the record,” she says, “but I think it will be interesting to see [the songs] from a greater perspective in time.”

For now, she’s realized how many obstacles stand in the way of normalcy for folks with chronic pain and invisible illness. “I would love to tour and I do feel physically capable, but with self-releasing [the LP] and all the money that goes into medical stuff I’m not in a place right now where I can do a ton of DIY touring, physically or financially,” she says. “So many labels, when they reach out to you, they’re like, are you touring? How much DIY touring are you doing? Not only is that really hard or close to impossible for people who are disabled, but it’s also really hard for people who don’t have a lot of money. So I think it’s kind of unfair in many ways, to have those expectations of an artist.” She also says that venues need to step up when it comes to accessibility, and is heartened by the active push for more of that from organizers like Sean Gray of Is This Venue Accessible.

Advocacy was on Jacobs’ mind when she wrote “Chosen Ones,” the album’s stirring closing track and one she says is among her favorites on The Only Thing. She says it was one of the most “impulsively emotive songs” on the album. “The emotion poured out and it happened so quickly and I was like, crying while writing [it],” she remembers. In it, she reminds her inner child that she’s worthy of love, and encourages her to fight for it. “Every day / You’re trying hard just to be brave / For the child screaming bloody murder inside,” she sings, letting her voice flutter wildly. “It’s such a dark thing to say, I just feel like there was no way to say something like that unless you’re doing it kind of wacky,” she says with a laugh. Like many of the songs on this record, the music is disarmingly buoyant given its subject matter, but that’s territory that Thelma navigates handily. “I think that was my only way to cope with what was going on [healthwise],” she says of the album’s swooning string sections and danceable grooves. “Also, it’s funny – I feel so much more since I went through this. I’ve become a much more empathetic person and feel so many more emotions. But I also feel like a little bit – no, a lot – tougher.”

Thelma’s sophomore record The Only Thing is out today; she’s playing a handful of shows over the next few months, where you can cry, dance, or do both, and hopefully say hi.

THELMA TOUR DATES

2/22 – Everybody Hits @ Philadelphia, PA *
2/23 – Secret Project Robot @ Brooklyn, NY *
3/1 – The Chateau @ Albany, NY
3/2 – Wherehouse @ Middletown, CT
* w/ Mutual Benefit

PET POLITICS: Two Lovebirds and a Little Honey Form the Core of Synthpop Band The Values

This month, I got to hear from Evan Zwisler and Mason Taub, founders of Brooklyn’s electro-indie-pop group The Values. Mason and Evan take the forefront as a duo—Mason working her deep and vibrant vocals along with the keys and Evan grooving on guitar and backing vocals—to pay homage to timeless R&B vibes and the dance punch of ’80s hits. In 2018 they released their EP Civil and are about to release a new music video for their song “Imposter” (keep your ears and eyes peeled). The Values also share some family values as a band; Mason and Evan recently got engaged (congratulations guys!) and they co-parent a sweet-as-can be pitbull named Honey who joins them on their tours and at photo shoots, and always has an ear-to-ear grin for fans of her family’s band. Is that a rock pup or what?!

AF: Please introduce us to your pup!

MT: Honey is a three-year-old blue nose pitbull, but most people think she’s a puppy when they meet her because she only grew to be about 40 pounds and she loves to be picked up (which is probably our fault honestly). She’s the most physically affectionate and emotionally connected dog I’ve ever had – she needs to be in constant physical contact. She also rarely barks but instead makes the weirdest sounds. Some of our friends have described them as an aggressively cooing dove, an angry baby, and an alien.

EZ: Honey is a hilarious and farty cuddle monster. She’s pretty much my best friend. Sometimes I’ll put on cute dog videos for us to watch together. She loves watching puppies crying! She also loves to be the center of attention, so we’ve actually brought her to a bunch of our photo shoots!

Mason, Honey, and Evan embarking on tour!

AF: How did you two meet, Mason and Evan?

MT: We met a few years ago when we were both nannying for kids who went to the same school in Brooklyn. We struck up a conversation in the schoolyard at pickup and the rest is history!

EZ: Yeah, I saw Mason and pretty much thought she was the most beautiful person ever. I didn’t have anything to say by the time I walked over to her, so I just asked, “Is this where pick up is?” I had been picking up the kids for three months at that point, but it was the best I could come up with!

AF: When did your fur baby come into your lives?

MT: We got Honey a little under three years ago when she was nine months old. A former bandmate of ours was her dogwalker, and the family that had bred her and her siblings couldn’t take care of her and her brother anymore in their tiny apartment. The two pups had been mostly living together in a shared crate, which is partly why I think she’s so aggressively affectionate. They needed a new home for her ASAP, so we met her, fell in love and took her home all in the same day.

AF: What is each of your musical backgrounds like?

EZ: I did the school musical from 6th grade to 8th grade; however, I wasn’t very good. They actually took away my one singing line in Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat and asked me to “Just say it with conviction.” I grew up in Shanghai so I was lucky enough to play in local bars with my various punk bands throughout high school. I never went to school for music or anything like that.

MT: I asked for piano lessons when I was six, so everything started there. I studied classical piano privately for 12 years, and have done a fair amount of teaching myself now. I did a lot of musicals in middle school and high school, but I really started singing around 11 years old when I started teaching myself my favorite songs by ear and would wait until my parents were out to sing my heart out to an empty house. I also dabbled in oboe, guitar, and double bass, but none of those really stuck!

AF: How did you start playing together?

MT: We started dating when Evan was just starting to play shows out in NYC and I was doing a lot of writing on my own. I would help him sometimes when we hung out, just little things like sounding out a melody or recording a harmony on a demo. Eventually he reluctantly let me be a part of it, and it’s evolved into what we’re doing now.

EZ: Mason is being overly modest. Very quickly into working together I realized how talented Mason was – she blows me out of the water. Not only is she amazing at everything she does but she also helps me articulate my ideas in a way that makes sense. I truly feel like I’ve found my partner in everything with her.

AF: Do either of you play in other projects?

MT: I would honestly love to, but we’re too busy to do much outside of our stuff. We have started doing little collabs here and there or helping people with Ableton, but that’s about it.

EZ: We’ve begun to produce for a few other songwriters around New York and Philly and we have a few collaborations planned. We’ve always dreamed of starting a Bikini Kill cover band, so if anyone is into that, call us.

AF: Where did you grow up, and did you have any pets then?

MT: I was born in California but I don’t remember living there because we moved to the suburbs of New York when I was really small. When I was 12 we moved to the Bronx, and I’ve been here in the city ever since! My family got a dog when I was 14. She was a Shetland Sheep Dog (think Lassie). I loved her so much, she was much more austere than Honey is. She was very Downton Abby, while Honey is very much Frank from It’s Always Sunny.

EZ: First, I feel like Honey is way more Charlie than Frank. And yeah I grew up with a bunch of dogs – when I was really young we had a big yellow lab named Bradley and a doberman mutt named Bowie, then a string of Chesapeake Bay Retrievers up through high school. I was born in Taiwan in ’90 and moved to Shanghai when I was 2. I then lived in Shanghai, China from 92-2008. It was a great place to play music because the scene was so small, but so supportive. No one really knew what we were doing – most people haven’t even been to America so it was a lot of earnest intimation.

Honey and Evan enjoying a snuggle session.

AF: What are your spirit animals?

EZ: I really like elephants, but I think Cookie Monster shares my love of life.

MT: Honestly sometimes I feel like Honey and I are each other’s spirit animals. We’re cut from the same anxious cloth.

AF: What instrument do you think Honey would play if she was a human?

MT: She’d be a punk drummer, for sure. She has a lot of upper body strength and looks like a tiny body builder.

EZ: Yeah, that’s absolutely brilliant. I also could picture her playing upright bass, wearing cool sunglasses and a backwards Kangol hat.

AF: Tell us a little about your writing process.

MT: We live together so we spend almost every night we’re free writing at home. We tend to write in Ableton and have a bunch of different things going at once. A lot of what we focus on is just establishing groove. Honey often curls up in Evan’s lap or in our gear cases while we work.

EZ: She always wants to be in the middle of the action! We usually sit down and write something from a fun drum beat or some cool sound we find on one of our synths. Sometimes, Mason will write something on the piano and bring that in. I feel that we’ve written some of our best songs like that.

AF: How did you decide to take Honey on tour?

MT: Out of necessity, honestly. Dog sitters can be expensive and Honey is just small and cute enough for us to get away with taking her places we wouldn’t normally.

Honey and Mason chilling in the trunk of the tour van.

AF: Can you tell us some funny family tour stories?

MT: We play in Philly a lot, and one time we were playing at this bar where the only place to park the car (with Honey inside) was either far away or illegally right in front. The bouncer, this big beautiful man named Bear, immediately took to her and let us park in front and looked after her while we played. Other times when we’ve played house parties, she likes to curl up in our suitcase on stage with us and sleep.

EZ: Yeah! She loves to come up on stage and sleep at our feet as we’re playing! She also likes to knock over beer cans and red cups at house shows so she can drink the beer! She’s kinda like Jim Belushi from Animal House in dog form.

AF: Do you have any favorite songs about (non-human) animals?

MT: Ha, no, but when I was little my dad used to tease me and tell me I should write songs about our Chesapeake Bay Retrievers Meg and Annie, but refer to them as my sisters. He was also always telling me to write songs about how much I loved my dad. I never took either of those pieces of advice.

EZ: Does “Werewolves of London” count?

AF: Have you ever written a song about or inspired by animals?

MT: We don’t have any songs just about animals, but I do mention Honey in a line in our song “Civil,” which is a breakup song, that goes, “Tell the dog I love her everyday,” which I think is kind of sweet and silly.

EZ: When I first moved to the city I wrote this song about putting my first dog down that I played at open mics. It was very sappy. I think it was probably an alright song, but it always felt emotionally manipulative playing it.

AF: When is your next show?

MT: March 2nd at the Knitting Factory!

AF: Any other tour dates on the horizon?

MT: We have a few things lined up in Philly (March 1st at Tralfamadore!) and a show in Western Massachusetts on March 15th, so follow us for more news on that!

AF: Do you have any more exciting news to share about your project?

MT: We just recorded a new EP with Holy Fang Studios so keep a look out for those singles to drop!

AF: When and where can we expect to find the “Imposter” video?

MT: It will be coming out next month. We are just finishing up editing it and then it’s ready to go! We has so much fun filming this one. We recreated a bunch of our favorite album covers and filmed a video around that.

EZ: I dress up as Lady Gaga and a banana. Let’s just say we hold nothing back on this one!

PREMIERE: Lovebird Duo The Bergamot Celebrate Valentine’s Day With “Periscope”

High school sweethearts Jillian and Nathaniel make up The Bergamot, an indie rock band based in Brooklyn. The two met in their home state of Indiana and moved to New York together to start their music career adventure, which lead to tours, performing at SXSW and releasing five albums.

Today, they release their music video for their latest single, “Periscope.” Produced by London-based engineer Matt Wiggins, “Periscope” was written by Nathaniel as a love song to Jillian as the couple took a long road trip and traversed across 50 states in 2016. The Bergamot is currently co-producing a full-length documentary also inspired by footage of this trip and the “Periscope” music video includes footage from six of the states over the course of three years. The duo is also set to release a full-length album and go on tour this summer. Here, they talk about their music video, their upcoming album Mayflies and what it takes to be successful partners in music and in life.

AF: Tell me a little bit about your band—are you husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend?

Nathaniel: Jillian and I are high school sweethearts from the heartland. We fell in love in Indiana, got married by my great Uncle and partied in a barn until the wee hours of the morning in South Bend, IN (2013). In the winter of that year we moved to NYC and never looked back. Our single “P.D.R.” began a journey for us that culminated with us traveling to London to make our new record with renowned Producer/Engineer Matt Wiggins. Our newest single “Periscope” is the first release from that journey and we could not be more excited to drop it on Valentines Day.

AF: Where was this music video filmed?

Jillian: It includes six States (HI, CA, MI, IL, TX, OR). The music video was filmed over a three-year period. Some of this footage is from our 50 State – 50,000 mile journey in 2016 filming a documentary called “State of the Unity” set to drop this year. The live footage is from a headlining show in Chicago (at Schubas) and from when we opened up for the X-Ambassadors in Austin, TX.

AF: What made you decide to compile three years worth of footage for the video?

Jillian: The last three years of our lives have been spent living out of suitcases all over the world. We have had amazing experiences and some devastating ones as well. With this new release, we really wanted to capture and share some of those real moments with our fans. In a way we wanted to take them on the road with us to see what it was like out there.

AF: What’s different about your relationship now that you work and play music together?

Nathaniel: We know our jobs, we know our roles, we help each other out and stay out of each other’s way when needed. I grew up working on a farm and Jillian grew up mowing lawns and saving money. Now we own a record label together. We work really hard and are not afraid to ask for help.

AF: What advice do you have for couples who work or create together?

Both: In the beginning, do everything. No matter what the task, just jump in and learn how to solve problems. There will be plenty of them. After a while, you begin to learn your strengths and weaknesses. Don’t be afraid to admit when you are wrong and if you fucked something up. Ask for forgiveness and help when you need it and sometimes when you don’t. Finally, learn to be strong for each other in times of weakness and never stop loving each other.

AF: Tell me a little bit about the message behind “Periscope.”

Nathaniel: Falling in love is easy, staying in love is hard. I have always been fascinated by the ocean. During our journey in 2016, I was reading the great maritime novel Moby Dick during our journey from sea to shining sea. Most of the book is spent swimming through life at sea. The great sighting only occurs in the last few pages of the book. The real story is the journey – and the journey the story. Road life has a way of stripping life down to the very basics. “Periscope” attempts to paint love as it occurs living out on the road. As if I was submerged under the ocean waters, viewing the vastness of life and love through the narrow lens of a periscope.

AF: Did you write it together?

Nathaniel: I wrote this song for Jillian halfway through our 50 State journey in 2016. It was a vulnerable period for myself and for our relationship. I was a struggling husband trying to let my worried wife know that we will be alright. Even though to this day I have probably never been more scared for our lives and overall well being then during those months. Those days still keep me up at night, the things we saw out on the road that year, but that’s for another time.

AF: You’re gearing up to release an album this summer – what can fans expect?

Both: Our new album Mayflies takes you on a journey. Just as the environmentally sensitive little creature the mayfly journeys fearlessly through its short and vulnerable life, so do we on our human journey. From a release standpoint, we have been pretty quiet over the last few years. Not for a lack of effort, that’s for sure. We had so much to learn and so much to write. When you are out there touring profound stories and wisdom that had been overlooked come to you and change your perspective.

Out here on the road, we experienced awe-inspiring stories and insights from everyday Americans. We had to go to all 50 states to find them, live with them, breathe with them. This was real. We are sick of a lot of the music on the radio and TV – so much posing. We are really proud of this collection of songs on Mayflies – the lyrics, arrangements, and productions. Matt Wiggins and his team are simply genius. We are deeply satisfied with the record we returned with from London.

AF: You’re also going to be touring this year and performing at Wanderlust Music Festival. When will you be releasing your tour stops and dates?

Jillian: Our summer dates are starting to fill up fast. We will be making a big summer/fall tour announcement in the next few months so stay tuned.

AF: Last but not least, how are the two of you celebrating Valentine’s Day?

Jillian: Most likely we will be eating PB&J’s in our van listening to Steinbeck somewhere on I-17 between Los Angeles, CA and Phoenix, AZ. That night we have a performance in AZ for a “Cloth & Flame” event in the desert which will be super fun. With a brand new album and a documentary on the horizon, times are tight but I can feel that our best times lie ahead of us and that is something to celebrate.

PREMIERE: Pleasure Prince, “Entry” EP

In the not-so-distant future, when the earth is covered in red sand dunes and everyone is finally wearing floor length metal space dresses, humans will need some sick jams to make love to. Brooklyn’s own Pleasure Prince is eager to provide the musical backdrop.

Musicians Lilly Scott and William Duncan use their voices in tandem throughout their new EP Entry, giving each song a playful tension, like new lovers flirting across a Voigt-Kampff machine. Off-kilter drums kick off “You Look Good To Me,” which slowly evolves into the disco beat of “Be My Friend” disco beat; the metallic touches on “Tropical Surprise” complete the ’80s noir vibe. Kick off your heels and pour yourself (and a date) a mezcal Manhattan – this album is sure to set the mood.

Read our interview with the band and listen to Entry below:

AF: Pleasure Prince is based out of Brooklyn, NYC. Where are you both from originally?

WD: We moved here together from Denver four years ago.

AF: What kind of music did you grow up listening to?

LS: I’m a diehard Beatles fan since childhood. My dad would always be blasting T-Rex and Zeppelin in the garage, and when I started learning guitar at age 12, those were my idols.

WD: Lots of classical music. Also Toto and Supertramp. My Mom wouldn’t stop listening to Joni Mitchell and Steely Dan.

AF: Entry has an ’80s Blade Runner feel to it. What was the catalyst for the sound?

WD: We used to be in a folk-rock band together for years, and when we moved to New York we just wanted to immerse ourselves in something different, and became obsessed with synthesizers. Also, I love Blade Runner.

LS: Both of us love experimenting with new sounds. We used our vintage ’80s Roland Juno-1 synth on this record, so the Blade Runner vibe was effortless, but not intentional. I used to get told I looked like the chick from Blade Runner when I had platinum hair back in the day.

AF: Can you tell us about the writing process? Do you normally start with the music or lyrics?

LS: It’s never the same – sometimes I’ll sit down and write a song by myself on the synth or guitar from start to finish. Other times, Will surprises me by creating a whole new track in Logic with all the parts already recorded without me. That’s when I like to come in with super creative “oohs” and “aaahs.”

WD: My main instrument is percussion. I’ve been collecting all sorts of crazy drum toys lately and have been inspired to start songs using just a beat and some bass. But in reality, it’s all about the vocals and the sweet Hall & Oates harmonies we hope to channel.

AF: You’ve been performing shows in Brooklyn. What’s the music scene there like? Is gentrification killing it or are underground shows expanding to the outer boroughs?

LS: We live just a few blocks away from Elsewhere, and enjoy being immersed in both the new all ages/big ticket venues, and the amazing underground scene, which is still very much alive in Brooklyn. We played the most insane house show this summer and had the best time meeting people from all different backgrounds in the local scene.

AF: What artists are ya’ll listening to right now?

WD: Can is always on repeat, love the new Porches record, Tomaga, and lots of old soul. Also Brian Eno forever.

LS: Tom Waits, Can, and Broadcast play everyday at some point. I have a constant urge to discover old releases from the ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s; I recently fell in love with Walter Wanderly. Also, the new Mr. Twin Sister is fire. I’ve been listening to them forever.

AF: Other than music, what inspires you and gets you in a creative mood?

WD: Lilly’s naked body.

LS: Will in his robe.

AF: What can an audience expect from a Pleasure Prince show?

LS: Pleasure Prince is all about spreading love and dancing your ass off. I love playing shows and I love when I see people in the audience smiling and having fun.

WD: We wrote sad bastard folk tunes for so many years, that we had to start a project that is all about feeling good and not taking yourself too seriously. We want people to have fun, because that’s what we’re doing.

Follow Pleasure Prince on YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter for tour dates!

Tag: Brooklyn