News – Page 29 – 7th Level Music

Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol announce winter and west coast U.S. tours.

Austin trio Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol today announce yet ANOTHER tour today, this time adding Western US headlining shows following their January & February East Coast tour with Lip Critic supporting.

RBBP is currently on tour with King Buffalo in the Southwest. Complete EU & UK tour dates for Spring 2025 will also be announced soon. See current dates below.

All March tickets Artist pre-sale on December 11th at 10am local time HERE. (password: bigdumbtour)

March tickets general on sale December 13th at 10am local time.

BIG DUMB RIFFS is available on digital, LP and cassette, released May 10th, 2024. Order/stream the album on all formats HERE.

RICKSHAW BILLIE’S BURGER PATROL – LIVE 2024:

12/10 Tucson, AZ – 191 Toole *

12/11 Las Vegas, NV – Swan Dive *

12/12 San Diego, CA – The Casbah *

12/13 Santa Ana, CA – Constellation Room *

12/14 Pioneertown, CA – Pappy & Harriet’s *

12/17 Fort Worth, TX – Tulips *

12/18 Oklahoma City, OK – Resonant Head *

12/19 Kansas City, MO – recordBar *

12/20 St. Louis, MO – Off Broadway *

* w/ King Buffalo

RICKSHAW BILLIE’S BURGER PATROL – LIVE 2025:

01/17 Austin, TX – Antone’s

01/24 Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall

01/25 San Antonio, TX – Paper Tiger

01/30 Nashville, TN – DRKMTTR +

01/31 Atlanta, GA – The Earl +

02/01 Charlotte, NC – Snug Harbor +

02/02 Washington, DC – DC9 +

02/04 Millersville, PA – Phantom Power +

02/05 New York, NY – Mercury Lounge +

02/06 Brooklyn, NY – TV Eye +

02/07 Medford, MA – Deep Cuts +

02/08 Montreal, QC – La Sotterenea +

02/11 Toronto, ON – Monarch Tavern +

02/12 Cleveland, OH – Beachland Tavern +

02/13 Hamtramck, MI – Small’s +

02/14 Chicago, IL – Empty Bottle +

02/15 Milwaukee, WI – Cactus Club +

02/16 Minneapolis, MN – Zhora Darling +

03/19 Phoenix, AZ – Linger Longer Lounge

03/20 San Diego, CA – Whistle Stop

03/21 Los Angeles, CA – Zebulon

03/22 Oakland, CA – Thee Stork Club

03/24 Portland, OR – Show Bar

03/25 Seattle, WA – Barboza

03/27 Salt Lake City, UT – Urban Lounge

03/28 Fort Collins, CO – The Coast

03/29 Denver, CO – Bluebird Theatre

03/30 Colorado Springs, CO – Vultures

05/15 Brussels, BE – Obsidian Dust Festival

05/18 London, UK – DesertFest London

05/23 Berlin, DE – DesertFest Berlin

+ w/ Lip Critic

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[Thanks to Dave at US / THEM Group.]

A.M. Architect release new track, “Avenir,” with guest vocalist Delenda.

For A.M. Architect, everything is interactive. A concert by the electronic duo isn’t just a concert. It’s a multimedia installation, a visual show, an interactive technology demonstration, and more.

At a typical show, the duo, consisting of longtime friends and collaborators Diego Chavez and Daniel Stanush, perform while generative visuals react to the audio they’re creating. “We use a program called TouchDesigner, so it’s all in real time,” says Chavez, whose myriad roles include digital media artist, technologist, and producer. “We love not being the performer; not being the cool guys on stage who have this distant presence. Usually, shows are so serious. It’s just fun to see people at play.”

That technological curiosity, that bold desire to merge disciplines, animates A.M. Architect’s third and finest full-length album, Avenir, announced today for a February 7th, 2025 release date.

The album showcases the duo’s multifaceted approach to electronic production, with Stanush’s musical training and melodic sensibility guiding Chavez’s knack for soundscapes and sonic manipulation. The result is a rich tapestry of pulsating beats, grainy loops, cinematic sensibilities, and charged vocal samples that cull from sources as varied as old crime movies and obscure country singers.

Today, the duo share their title-track “Avenir,” accompanied by a music video. The track paints a lush electronic beat backdrop of exploration, with notable vocals from guest Delenda. Pre-order the upcoming album here, and check it out the video for the title track on YouTube.

On the track, Daniel Stanush shares:

“In creating the music video for Avenir, we were inspired by the lyrics written by our collaborator Delenda. We were interested in the relationships between different versions of ourselves: the person you used to be, as seen through your current self, or vice versa. Like when you remember the promises you made yourself when you were a kid, or the things you regret and wish you could erase, and then as you grow you have to reconcile your old and new self, and the past/present relationship that creates.

Graphically, we wanted to present a dissonance between our self-perspectives, and allow them to evolve and blend together, constantly growing and fracturing, feeding back and diffusing based on a responsive video network, so we shot some video with Delenda, the song’s vocalist, and then created an interactive network in Touch Designer that would respond to video inputs as well as allow us to control how the network would respond. We’re really looking forward to bringing this same setup to live events and allowing audiences to interact with the Avenir in fun ways.”

The two worked on the album remotely for about four years, trading files back and forth between Sacramento (where Stanush lives) and San Antonio (Chavez’s home base). Stanush developed melodic ideas on guitar, bass, and Rhodes piano, while Chavez manipulated the tracks in Ableton and incorporated a range of innovative techniques, including machine learning and live-coding with the help of a portable, open-source sound computer called Monome Norns.

Above all, Chavez and Stanush sought to create music that would feel untethered to any particular time period; music that, like their influences, feels timeless and unmoored.

Chavez and Stanush tend to refer to A.M. Architect as a “multimedia collaboration” rather than a traditional band. The two have been close collaborators since around 2004, when they met while playing in rock bands in San Antonio together. Realizing they shared a love of electronic music (everything from German cult artist Arovane to the early work of Caribou, then billed as Manitoba) and a deep interest in the intersection of art and technology, the two began a side project, which morphed into A.M. Architect.

In 2009, they released their first album, The Road to the Sun, a nimble, beat-driven collection pairing Stanush’s melodic instincts with Chavez’s drum programming. Stanush had studied music theory and knew his way around a guitar or bass, while Chavez came from a hip-hop background and knew how to treat his bandmate’s instruments as samples, with a DJ Shadow-like apt for manipulating rhythms

That division of labor remained largely constant through the project’s subsequent albums—2017’s Color Field, 2019’s Chroma Variants—as their stylistic ambitions grew and the group moved away from live instrumentation in favor of ambient production. With an increased emphasis on vocal samples, Avenir (a French word meaning “the future, or a time to come”) brings A.M. Architect into a new phase of their career, veering towards ambient electronica instead of instrumental hip-hop and instilling their chilly soundscapes with an unmistakable warmth.

Stanush developed melodic ideas on guitar, bass, and Rhodes piano, while Chavez manipulated the tracks in Ableton and incorporated a range of innovative techniques, including machine learning and live-coding with the help of a portable, open-source sound computer called Monome Norns.

Because it was written in the throes of the pandemic, the material felt heavier than usual, with both musicians reflecting on death, mortality, and memories. Such themes were front of mind during the early years of the pandemic, when the duo began experimenting with audiovisual installations. At a warehouse in Sacramento, they led a major installation, using cameras to track people’s motions through the space, which then triggered different lines of melody and visual art on the walls. “We want to be able to bring that kind of experience to more of our projects,” Stanush notes.

Such experiments proved formative to the inventive, free-form spirit of Avenir. As Chavez reflects, “It changed our idea of how songs don’t have to be linear. As long as you’re in it, you can make the song move around. We like to play with time differently.” And true to its forward-thinking title, Avenir brings the future to your headphones even as it summons poignant reflections on the past.

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[Thanks to George at Terrorbird Media.]

Howard “Keep Running” with their new single.

Howard delivers rock infused with Hammond organ, fuzz, and electronic elements that have travelled through the decades. Inspired by legends like Deep Purple and The Doors, they reinvent the genre with a modern energy. Following their self-produced debut EP HOWARD I in 2018, the band hit the road, sharing stages with acts such as Ayron Jones, Yarol Poupaud, Last Train, Ko Ko Mo, Mars Red Sky, The Psychotic Monks, Slift, and Dätcha Mandala. Their first album, Obstacle, was released in 2020, right on the eve of the first lockdown. Despite their tour being postponed, the album received positive coverage in specialized press in France. Refusing to be discouraged, Howard released their second album, Event Horizon, in 2022, followed by a 50-date tour over two years, including a sold-out release party in Paris (FR) with +300 people.

On stage, the band reaches a whole new level, captivating audiences with a dynamic and intricate show. Howard has established itself as one of the most promising emerging bands in today’s french rock scene. By the end of 2024, the trio continues their rise, signing with RAGE TOUR and planning to release a new album on March 28th 2025.

After DON’T MAKE ME GO BACK, Howard continues with second single KEEP RUNNING, a track that once again raises urgent themes. Supported by a one-shot music video featuring an individual pushing his limits behind a fake smile, the song is also about mental health. Maintaining appearances and ignore inner struggles by withdrawing and deceiving oneself ? Unfortunately, many can relate to this scenario. KEEP RUNNING explores three key emotions — depression, euphoria, and breakdown. In just three minutes, the track takes listeners on a journey from coldwave landscapes to wild arpeggios that explode into an intense rock finale, showcasing Howard’s newfound intensity. KEEP RUNNING embodies the aesthetic of their upcoming album OSCILLATIONS, set for release on March 28, 2025.

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Hepcat’s classic “Scientific” album gets a dub remix by, go figure, Scientist.

Watch Lost Music Video “Bobby and Joe”- Watch / Share

Today Trust Records is honored to release Scientist Meets Hepcat: Scientific Dub Special and the deluxe reissue of Scientific of which the collaboration and remixes were derived from. This special reissue package is available in stores now and across all digital platforms. It’s the first time Scientific has been available on vinyl in years. All audio was remastered from the original analog tapes by Pete Lyman. The limited vinyl version of Scientist Meets Hepcat: Scientific Dub Special sold out in just an hour.

Hepcat was formed in 1989 by the late vocalist Greg Lee and keyboardist Deston Berry. Their soulful harmonies and mellow rhythms were unlike those of contemporaries and more akin to musicians from the heyday of 1960s Jamaican ska. Mixed with elements of soul, jazz and R&B, their singular sound quickly cemented them as staples in Los Angeles’ burgeoning ska scene in the early 90’s.

Following the release of their critically acclaimed debut Out of Nowhere on legendary label Moon Ska Records, Hepcat released their signature sophomore effort in 1996, Scientific. “It’s the album in which we all got together and figured sh*t out, tweaking controls and dialing in the perfect vibe, like a chemistry set—hence the name. We spent so much time and energy on that album. Labor of love, worth every moment,” Hepcat tell.

Fast forward to 2021, archival label Trust Records purchased controlling interest of the BYO catalog, including Hepcat’s Scientific. While in discussions with late founding member and lead vocalist Greg Lee on how he would like to see the album re-released, he let it be known that his dream of all dreams was to have legendary dub producer Scientist create a dub version of the album.

Hopeton Brown, known as Scientist, is the legendary electronic and studio engineer, considered to be one the forefathers of Dub Music. He developed his skills in the late 70’s and 80’s at the legendary King Tubby Studios with the revolutionary use of reverb, delay, and other effects to transform traditional reggae tracks into groundbreaking dubs. To date, Scientist has over 50,000 song credits, and he is still creating today.

“Greg Lee believed it would be cool if Scientist would dub ‘Scientific’. He liked the play on names and the historic implications. Like a true fan, Greg sought out information from various sources and finally was introduced to Scientist by Brian Wallace aka: Dub Robot at the legendary Dub Club in Los Angeles. Greg worked his magic and Scientist agreed to create dub’s of ‘Scientific’. The rest is now history,” Hepcat explain.

Those final dub mixes of Scientific were approved by Greg Lee and the band in January of 2024, just before Greg tragically died two months later of a brain aneurysm.

“Greg Lee is Hepcat personified. One of the strongest and greatest songwriters of Hepcat’s history. A mastermind. A positive source of inspiration. A leader. An eternal flame. The member who kept it fun and enjoyable, while being strong, and powerful at the same time,” Hepcat commemorates.

Hepcat’s Alex Desert Sits Down w/ Scientist In Trust Records’ One Two Me You Interview Series – Watch / Share

Scientist Curates Essential Dub Tracks Playlist in Celebration of Hepcat Collaboration – Listen / Share

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[Thanks to Bailey at Another Side.]

Skeleten releases new single, “Bodys Chorus,” ahead of upcoming album due February 07, 2025.

Today, Sydney-based artist Skeleten (aka Russell Fitzgibbon) unveils new single “Bodys Chorus”, ahead of his forthcoming second album release, Mentalized, arriving in full on February 7, 2025 via 2MR / Astral People Recordings.

“Bodys Chorus” pulls you in with hypnotic synth-bell chimes, and pushes you back with staccato overdrive guitar stabs, as if shaking you out of a daydream. Turntablist scratching is layered within the sonic texture of both the song and the album to come, an homage to nu-metal and trip hop’s humanistic approach to electronic music. It’s an attention to detail that Skeleten relishes in, and which rewards deep listens.

Listen / Share / Playlist “Bodys Chorus”

Mentalized exists in a rich sonic universe defined by hypnotic yet emotive songwriting, and organic production that draws from a vast blend of influences. Where Skeleten’s lauded debut album Under Utopia celebrated a world of hope and beauty pushed upwards by us all, his second record will posit that this push comes with a struggle. It is less about the fantastical, and more about asking how we are mentalized, and taken away from ourselves everyday. To play in this world doesn’t come without working for it, and that struggle is best when shared.

“Bodys Chorus” joins his recent singles “Deep Scene”, “Love Enemy”, and “Viagra”, alongside respective remixes by Axel Boman and Spray, in laying the foundations for Mentalized. The releases earned nods from Stereogum, PAPER, Brooklyn Vegan, Paste, KEXP, KCRW and more.

In 2023, Skeleten emerged with his critically adored, ARIA-charting album, Under Utopia. Described by The FADER as “perfect for the fans of the minds-eye psychedelia of Caribou and DJ Koze”, the record was nominated for the Australian Music Prize (2023), AIR Awards Best Independent Dance or Electronica Albumor EP (2024) and FBi Radio’s SMAC Award for Album of the Year (2023), named at #20 in NME AU’s Top 25 Albums of 2023, and #27 in Double J’s 50 Best Albums of 2023, and saw remixes from the likes of Logic1000 and Jennifer Loveless. Having performed with The Streets, Tirzah, SBTRKT, DJ Seinfeld, Hot Chip and Glass Beams, he has also since been booked for major Australian festivals Dark Mofo, VIVID LIVE, Splendour In The Grass, and sold a number of headlines including the Sydney Opera House.

Ahead of a special appearance at Golden Plains festival in 2025, Skeleten is curating a regular live series at Newtown’s Pleasure Club. Recently debuting this month alongside Hugh B and the Modern Pop Ensemble and Killian, the residency’s intention will be spotlighting local talent across the city’s different scenes, alongside Skeleten and his full live band. Skeleten is on track to make his North American debut next year – for updates and more, go here.

Pre-Order / Pre-Save / Playlist Mentalized

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[Thanks to Bailey at Another Side.]

Liquid Bear release title track from upcoming album, “Second Life.”

Confronting their respective influences and breaking down musical genre boundaries, french prog’ band Liquid Bear, explores themes such as addiction, the search for meaning, and the passage of time. The quartet delivers a raw yet enchanting rock sound, featuring bold compositions enhanced by remarkable instrumental mastery. With a discography that mixes grunge, stoner rock, progressive, and psychedelic rock, the four musicians offer an experience that is both visceral and cerebral. Liquid Bear released their first EP, Unwind, at the end of 2018, followed by their second, Heavy Grounds, in March 2021. Alongside their music, the band has developed an increasingly sophisticated visual identity, exemplified by the animated video for Billions of Crabs, and Closer to an End.

Liquid Bear’s debut album, Second Life, will be released on February 7, 2025, as an independent production, with the title track dropping today, accompanied by a lyrics video : https://youtu.be/LVsLG1x2ZTQ.

Second Life, the first single and title track of their upcoming album, showcases their unique vision of rock that is both original and modern. This introspective track delves into retracing one’s choices and imagining what could have been different if another path had been taken. With its stormy riff combining a fretless guitar and Hammond organ, Second Life captivates the listener. The powerful track is paired with a psychedelic visual journey through a being in a state of constant reconstruction, where every particle dances and resonates with the music.

“Second Life” explores various aspects of the construction of our individuality and the influences of our social environment. After two EPs and two singles in which the quartet sculpted their modern Progressive Rock sound, this album stands as the cornerstone of what defines Liquid Bear’s signature sound.

The album emphasizes experimentation and sonic renewal, particularly through the unique approach of the fretless guitar. It features the band’s signature elements: Hammond organ, vocal harmonies, compelling riffs, and guitar solos, enhanced by the addition of drum machines and analog synthesizers.

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Bonnie Trash announce first full-length album, “Mourning You,” and offer its first single – “Veil of Greed.”

Today Guelph, Ontario hell-raisers Bonnie Trash announce details of their new album, ‘Mourning You’, which is set for release on February 28th on Hand Drawn Dracula. Along with the announcement they have shared the first single and video from the album, entitled “Veil of Greed”.

‘Mourning You’ is, put bluntly, an album about death. Not death in the macabre, violent, or outrageous sense, but death as you or I might know it. A spectre lurking around the corner. Capricious, indiscriminate, and unexpected. Ordinary and all the more terrifying for it. Real. Fear in the eyes of a loved one about to die, and the fear in your eyes – staring back.

Bonnie Trash is the horrorgaze project of twin sisters Emmalia & Sarafina Bortolon-Vettor, wedding post-punk’s steely-eyed austerity to goth rock’s brooding grandeur.

‘Mourning You’ finds Bonnie Trash embracing a newfound sense of urgency. A lifelong project christened in 2017 with the release of ‘Ezzelini’s Dead’, the band’s debut EP which found the pair mining the Trevisan dialect and archaic Italian folklore of their heritage to grisly effect. Where their first full length, ‘Malocchio’ (2022), shrouded Bonnie Trash’s nightmares in dusky dreamlike reverb, ‘Mourning You’ is vivid and immediate. Emboldened by the addition of Emma Howarth-Withers on bass and Dana Bellamy on drums – whose thunderous rhythms sharpened 2024’s ‘My Love Remains the Same’ EP into a fine-edged blade – ‘Mourning You’ is less a post-mortem fantasia than a sudden, swift dagger to the heart. This is sorrow not as a lingering bruise, but a gushing wound.

Bonnie Trash unveil their new project with this first single “Veil of Greed”. Emmalia’s gripping and unyielding guitar riff with all the icy malice of Nine Inch Nails’ Pretty Hate Machine introduces the urgency of the uncomfortably ordinary horror story that unfurls across the record. The song’s gruesome imagery – feasting on hearts with rotten teeth – finds Sarafina worshipping at the altar of her agony. “I bow down before you and I know / You feed.”

“When you lose the one you love so dearly, it’s a cut that’s so deep, it rips your heart out of your chest. You try to continue on, but you suffer and you bleed” the twins comment. “Grief is like an open wound that will never fully heal. It can consume you if you let it. Sometimes, it’s best to let it feed, allowing the pain to exist with the beautiful memories you hold close to your heart.”

“Veil of Greed” video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQzTivht8mE
‘Mourning You’ album pre-order/pre-save links: https://ffm.to/mourningyou

Sarafina, the band’s singer and lyricist, has described the album as being about “losing someone you love. It’s about the horrors of grief, haunting you every day.” Inspired, largely, by the passing of Nonna Maria – who provided interstitial narration across the band’s early work – it’s these intimate details which render the songs on ‘Mourning You’ so devastating. The record explores love and grief as kindred spirits. Grief as love with nowhere to go. Love determined by the fear of its loss. A blood pact. A life for a life. The gnarled claw of remorse gripping you in twilight’s terror.

Though inspired by the shocking iconography of horrorshows, slasher flicks, and psychological thrillers, Bonnie Trash turns cinematic tropes on their head. Rather than fashioning nightmares into reality, the band paints reality as a nightmare, rife with pain, suffering, and gothic theatre. Bonnie Trash understands that everyday atrocities haunt the periphery of our lives. A black cloud looming on the edge of our vision. Curses abound. You can’t ward them off. You’d best make an unholy racket.

‘Mourning You’ is out February 28, 2025 on Hand Drawn Dracula. In mourning, all is lost.

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[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Sleepbomb releases “Refuge / Resist,” latest single from upcoming album “The Sleeping Dead.”

“Refuge/Resist is like the film (Night of the Living Dead) itself.” – explains Clair Hamard. ‘Alternating long, uncertain pauses with both dramatic and physical tension. Just like the scene in the movie that presents characters at complete odds with each other building up a precarious shelter threatened by the zombies amassing outside, the harmonic construction of this track is constantly challenged by an imminent dissonant attack.’

With every moment of calmness, supported by repetitive drone-sounds, Sleepbomb deliver the symbiosis of etherial vocal harmonies and agressive riffing. While the absence of any real resolution at the end of the track heralds the future failure of the plan hatched by the characters, unable to cooperate.

According to bassist, Tim Gotch, “Refuse/Resist” reflects the dichotomy of the film “as a whole.” “It begins as a refuge for Barbara, who enters the seemingly deserted house while fleeing from the zombie. She quickly discovers that the house is less of a refuge than she thought, exacerbated by the abrupt arrival of Ben. Ben quickly proves himself to not be a threat as he dispatches multiple zombies.”

Subtitled Excerpts from their score for George Romero’s 1968 ‘Night of the Living Dead‘ and based on their full length score for the film, The Sleeping Dead is an epic serving of filmic doom. Starting with the drum parts fully synchronized with the cinematic imagery, during the recording process each track was pared down to the essential character of each scene from the most influential zombie film of them all. ‘Unlike ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’, we knew that the final product would not be a fully synchronized score due to rights issues and the large amount of dialogue in the film.’ states Gotch. ‘This meant that we were able to edit down some of the longer sections into a “song” format and really focus on the feel of the scenes for The Sleeping Dead record itself rather than retaining the full length of tracks just for timing requirements.’

Recorded, mixed and mastered at Earhammer Studios by Greg Wilkinson (High on Fire, Autopsy), The Sleeping Dead shows Sleepbomb in a heavy, focused mood.

Pre-order The Sleeping Dead coming out this January 24 via Koolarrow/Consouling Sounds here. Or on Bandcamp here.

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Open Head share new single, “N.Y. Frills,” ahead of upcoming new album due January 24, 2025.

The sound of What Is Success, Open Head’s second album and debut for Wharf Cat Records (out Jan 24), started with an argument in the practice space. The members of the heaviest band in Kingston, NY, and perhaps the entire world, were tired of their instruments. The post-punk they’d been playing together for the previous five years or so was beginning to feel like a sort of prison—the opposite of the freedom they initially got together to pursue.

“Nothing sounded good,” remembers Jared Ashdown, one of the band’s two guitarist-vocalists. “It was, ‘I hate my guitar,’ ‘I hate my bass,’ Alright, then let’s stop playing them.”

Something clicked. Bassist Jonathan McCarthy gravitated toward synthesizer, playing low notes like idling hovercraft. Ashdown picked up a sampler loaded with industrial field recordings made by drummer Daniel Scwhartz, running them through a bevy of effects pedals and using them as uncanny percussion instruments. Schwartz himself began incorporating rhythms drawn from Open Head’s mutual love of left-field electronic dance music. Rather than actually putting down their guitars, Brandon Minnervini and Ashdown delved further into their ongoing exploration of extended techniques, turning their instruments into celestial chimes or electric motors, sometimes vast and textural and other times pinprick-precise.

This new approach has paid dividends for Open Head, who have been attracting more and more attention of late. Recent underground favorites, who have shared stages with bands like, Geese, Dummy, Show Me The Body, Cola, and Water From Your Eyes over the past couple of years, the band’s newest material has come in for critical praise as well, with early singles “Catacomb” and “House” attracting attention from Pitchfork, Stereogum, Consequence, BrooklynVegan and Post-Trash who described “House” as “a pummeling, ruinous single that draws deep from the well of NYC avant-garde.”

Today, the band are back with a new preview of their LP, a track called “N.Y. Frills” that is premiering with FLOOD.

Open Head say of the track:

In a sort of homage to New York No-Wave, N.Y. Frills is an encounter with the monotone Goliath that is Manhattan. Our guitarist Brandon Minnervini sings the song, and together with bassist Jon McCarthy he wrote it while working for a fabrication business in Kingston, sanding designer aluminum shelving. Every so often, Brandon would be tasked with delivering the products to ultra-wealthy patrons in New York City.

A drive that started at a dusty Kingston warehouse would end in the alien opulence of a Manhattan penthouse, or a private AI sports betting clubs, or a ‘development workshop’ full of untouched fabrication machines occupying prime manhattan real-estate, and then back again. Brandon brushed up against the type of wealth most never see. The song is a meditation on contact with those who live with such extravagance, and their detachment from those who make it possible on physical and material level. From a similar perspective the song describes Open Head’s relationship with New York City in general–one of both proximity and distance, where the city is always within reach, yet the band is always a visitor, an outsider to its tempo, its density and its size.

Lyrically, the song is the return journey from a brush with the extravagant. It begins in the high-rise, amidst the luxury class, and with each verse drops “lower still,” until the narrator sinks to become the ground itself—no different than the physical earth that supports the weight of the city. “Heaven’s gate, sink and wait, object love, interest rates.”

LISTEN TO OPEN HEAD’S “N.Y. FRILLS”

PREORDER WHAT IS SUCCESS HERE

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Camp Saint Helene is featured on Angel Olsen’s upcoming “Cosmic Waves Volume 1” album with a new single – “Wonder Now.”

Last week, Angel Olsen announced Cosmic Waves Volume 1, out December 6th via somethingscosmic. Cosmic Waves Volume 1 is a compilation project consisting of both new, original songs from Camp Saint Helene, Poppy Jean Crawford, Coffin Prick, Sarah Grace White, and Maxim Ludwig on Side A, and a collection of covers from the aforementioned artists performed and recorded by Olsen on Side B. The artists on Cosmic Waves Volume I draw from a sprawling, myriad sounds, eras and inspirations, and unsurprisingly, each song illuminates a new artist Olsen finds spectacular. Hearing Olsen refract the artists’ songs back to them reveals the depth of Olsen’s imagination, while spotlighting multiple exciting artists at work.

On the heels of “Glamorous” by Poppy Jean Crawford and “The Takeover (Poppy Jean Crawford Cover)” by Angel Olsen come two new songs from the compilation: the beautiful, big sky folk-oriented “Wonder Now” by Camp Saint Helene and “Farfisa Song (Camp Saint Helene Cover)” by Angel Olsen.

Created by Elizabeth Celeste Ibarra, Dylan Nowik, Wesley Harper and Alex Wernquest, Catskills, NY-based Camp Saint Helene approach their craft akin to a ritual, leaning into the notion that art and expression are sacred experiences on an overstimulated planet. Often informed by the spirit of a defunct Christian-summer camp turned arts-colony deep within the mountains of New York, their music searches for shimmers of hope amidst hints of doom and invites listeners on a journey of self-discovery amidst shifting perspectives.

Describing her introduction to Camp Saint Helene, Angel says “We were driving to Trust, NC to shoot the cover and campaign for Big Time and Silken Weinberg and Angela Ricciardi were introducing me to some projects they were about to work on – one being for the band Camp Saint Helene, an album that was the perfect backdrop of cult folk for our adventure into the wild mountains of Buncombe county. After our shoot wrapped, I kept coming back to the record and feeling like it had encapsulated the memory of a chapter ending, and when I want to go back to the days of sunset at max patch, I put it on.”

Watch Visualizer for Camp Saint Helene’s “Wonder Now”

Stream “Farfisa Song (Camp Saint Helene Cover)” by Angel Olsen

On the concept of a compilation reimagined as a dialogue, Olsen explains “I personally always learn something new about the process when I’m engaging someone else’s words and melodies in such a close way. It’s fun to write and make my own stuff, but listening to and putting myself into various different styles of songs can lead to new ways of thinking and creating.”

On December 6th, somethingscosmic will present the Cosmic Waves Volume 1 release show at In The Meantime in Los Angeles. The bill will include Camp Saint Helene, Sarah Grace White, Maxim Ludwig, Poppy Jean Crawford, Coffin Prick (DJ), and special guests.

Pre-order Cosmic Waves Volume 1

Stream “Glamorous” by Poppy Jean Crawford

Watch Visualizer for Poppy Jean Crawford’s “Glamorous”

Stream “The Takeover (Poppy Jean Crawford Cover)” by Angel Olsen

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[Thanks to Jaycee at Pitch Perfect PR.]