Austin, TX ghoul-pop trio Stretch Panic are preparing to release their debut LP, Glitter & Gore, in early 2021. Glitter & Gore is a thirteen track, hook-heavy, kooky, collection of thematically rich tunes, that finds the group exorcising their inner demons while conjuring new ones. READ MORE…
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Wolves have long appeared as symbols in songs—spectral embodiments of solitary spirit animals driven by otherworldly passions and a mystical sense of freedom. After all, everyone from Duran Duran to the Los Angeles punk band X has invoked the hungry wolf in their songs detailing their most uncanny allegorical excursions into the night.
With her latest album, titled The Fever Returns, Atlanta-based singer, guitar player, and songwriter K Michelle DuBois pushes the boundaries of her Southern-inflected indie-pop songs toward mysterious new and nocturnal terrain. Throughout the album, unlikely musical bedfellows—highly cultivated guitar tones, boundless pop production, and metaphysical imagery—placed side by side form singularly pleasing and full-bodied combinations.
The album’s opening title track comes to a head with a lingering rumination. DuBois sings: “Broke free from a comfort zone / Was it really that good? / Or were you just hiding / Seeing things you ain’t seen before / Walk right through an open door / You get so excited.”
Her words cast light on a path snaking through songs with titles such as “Heaven,” “Firestar,” and “Baby Witch,” each one finding the earth, the moon, the stars, and the elements taking on deeper and higher meanings amid her bounding melodies.
It’s in the song “Strawberry Moon,” though when the wolves come out. The music builds subtly at first. The sound of wolves howling in the darkness blend with lingering percussion and synth lines, all resonating on the same spectral frequency. DuBois eases into the song, adding texture as she sings, “I was hunted beneath the Strawberry Moon / All told, my sole purpose was finding a place / Finding a place where we could stay wild.” The sound of her voice and the shape of her words stir up a pensive atmosphere. It’s here in the midst of “Strawberry Moon” where she reveals the vital essence of The Fever Returns, and it’s message of looking deep within to make sense of her place in the world.
“It’s about finding your powers and your strengths—honing them,” DuBois says. “Let them be the impetus for you to leave your comfort zone, and to go out and experience new things, and to open new doors.”
The album’s title and its opening number came to DuBois in the Spring of 2019, while she was stuck in bed, fighting a months-long illness. “I was spending a lot of time at home, much like right now,” DuBois says. “I had a horrible fever that was coming and going, and then I started thinking about it in different terms, like a fever for life, or whatever your passion may be, and ideas started coming together.”
DuBois has a long history within the Atlanta music scene. Her affinity for music began when she was a teenager living in Nashville. One year, she was given a bass guitar as a Christmas gift. Composing music has remained a central theme in her life ever since.
After moving to Atlanta years later, DuBois formed the group Ultrababyfat with her longtime friend and collaborator Shonali Bhowmik. With the release of their album Silver Tones Smile in 1998, the band’s sweet and infectious pop-punk hooks landed the group on stage with groups such as Pavement and PJ Harvey and comedian David Cross. In 2001, Ultrababyfat became one of the few female-fronted bands to grace the Warped Tour stage.
Bhowmik moved to New York shortly after and though tempted to follow, DuBois stayed in Atlanta and formed Luigi with whom she explored a more experimental side of indie pop, culminating with 2008’s CD, Found On The Forest Floor.
It was during her time with Luigi that she began working with producer, engineer, and lifelong friend Dan Dixon. In conversation, DuBois describes Dixon as a “sound artist,” who now runs his own studio, dubbed RCDC Studio. Over the years he’s become DuBois’ go-to producer, engineer, and sounding board.
Over the years, Dixon has worked with various artists, ranging from the Doobie Brothers with Zac Brown, to garage rock and punk outfits Biters, Curtis Harding, and his own recent collaboration with the Coathangers drummer Stephanie Luke dubbed Nrcssst.
In 2012, DuBois emerged once again, this time as a solo artist, releasing her debut full-length, Lux Capone. She switched gears to work with producer Ben Price at Studilaroche, who helped her reconnect with her roots as a songwriter. Soon, though, she rejoined Dixon to create the indie-pop hooks heard throughout her 2016 album Astral Heart. DuBois and Dixon continued working together for 2018’s Harness, and again for The Fever Returns.
“Dan is like a brother to me, and knows me so well,” DuBois says. “Each time we record together it gets better.”
Harness and The Fever Returns function almost as companion pieces to one another, and their connection developed naturally.
“I watch a lot of T.V., and a lot of my inspiration comes from things that I might be binge-watching at the time,” she says. “Some of the shows that I really got into—I loved Westworld, which had a melancholy vibe to it—stepped me into the material for these albums. I felt a similar vibe, and it took off like a train. Everything I wrote in that vein inspired me for the next song. One song would inspire something after that, and then another and another.”
In the end, the album is an almost defiantly mature collection of songs with a wide angle focus on two things: DuBois connecting with the more ethereal elements of nature, and the freedom to explore her own creativity without restraint. With The Fever Returns, she has made a terrific, layered record that exceeds expectations. Not only has she found wholly new dimensions hidden within her own voice and songwriting, she lets them howl.
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Zombies, vampires, witches, ghosts and other macabre staples — these are the tools that Austin ghoul-pop trio Stretch Panic ultizes for exploring the human condition. Using these beloved Halloween archetypes, this charming three-piece spins haunted tales of characters trapped in nuanced states of emotional limbo. At the band’s core is a tender heart for misunderstood monsters.
That is essentially the through-line of the group’s debut LP, Glitter & Gore. Across 13 hook-heavy, kooky, thematically rich tunes, they exorcise their inner demons while conjuring new ones. Picture 1967’s Mad Monster Party, only with more synth and ghostly harmonies.
“I grew up in a haunted house,” says singer and multi-instrumentalist MJ Haha. “That’s why I love ghost stories and spooky stuff so much. Once I made peace with a ghost by singing to it. It was a song about how I knew what it was like to feel lonely and that I knew it felt very alone. Ever since, the house was a much friendlier place.”
Haha had been daydreaming of a project performed by ghost-girl characters when local Austin music blog The Nothing Song, (run by beloved talent booker Trish Connelly), sent out an open call for new spooky singles. The band’s current line up – Haha, Jennifer Monsees, and Cassie Baker – had been circling for years as friends and collaborators within the Austin music scene, crystallizing as Stretch Panic just in time for Halloween 2016 with their first bedroom recording, “They’re Coming Out For You.”
Spurred by the positive reception towards their first release, they accepted their first show offer without having fully written any other songs. Three months later, (in collaboration with songwriter cousins William Riot and Ashley Woodruff), the band finished a collection of campy haunted tunes. Performing their first set, they solidified the colorful take on Halloween that would come to define the group.
“What we all had in common was a love for silly Halloween kitsch,” Haha says, “and we’ve incorporated that in every way we’ve dressed the music.”
Some tunes are inspired by actual horror films: The atmospheric “Psycho Mama” is a direct homage to Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, and the fizzy garage-pop of “Burn the Witch” nods to the imagery of Dario Argento classic Suspiria. But many borrow equally from real life. As Haha puts it: “When Hillary lost in 2016, there were a lot of “nasty woman” slurs being thrown around, and I realized we were still blaming women and figuratively burning them at the stake. Sadly as it goes in the song, ‘This poor martyr can’t stop evil.’”
As they developed their sound, they combined influences from previous girl-band giants such as The Shangri Las, The 5.6.7.8’s, and The Slits, with the playful elements of The B-52s, They Might Be Giants, The Sonics, and The Unicorns. Baker’s infectious energy and Monsees’ steady grounding blended with Haha’s theatrical narratives to create their own candy-coated spin on riot grrrl post-punk, ’90s indie-rock, and doo-wop. By Halloween season 2017, the trio found themselves touring the United States, promoting their garage-recorded debut EP, Ghost Coast.
With the world easing into the political turmoil we’ve come to know since 2016, the Panics aimed to create a safe space with their songs, drawing on their love of fantastical stories, campy horror film classics, and the surreal animated series Adventure Time. “I wanted to share that feeling of delightful cuteness — but also there’s a message we think is important: it’s a wonderful thing to develop empathy for those you might not understand.” says Haha.
Many of their early tracks achieved that goal, marrying poppy melodies with subtly rich storytelling that probes beyond the surface level sonic cartoons. However, the band wasn’t satisfied with the hastily assembled EP; It took a bit more refining — and the musical maturation earned through touring — to hone the more sculpted and cinematic Glitter & Gore.
The album, recorded and mixed by master sound engineer Justin Douglas of King Electric Studios, builds on Ghost Coast’s foundation — revamping many of its songs with cleaner production, tighter vocal harmonies, and quirkier arrangements.
“Justin drew out the potential of these songs up to a completely different level,” says Haha, “Like in adding a prepared piano to the end of “Burn the Witch” or recording one of our instrumentals in half time so when played at full speed, played incredibly slow and spooky. He transformed each of our songs into the most magical version of itself and it would not sound this fantastic without him.”
Baker brought into the recording a brilliant and playful sense of percussive theater using tools like the flextone and slide whistle, instruments from her percussion show for kids. Meanwhile, Monsees brought her vigilant sense of timing, her careful ear for harmonies, and her emphasis on staying true to the emotional core of the music. William Riot returned with a completely fresh chiptune composition for “I Can’t Help It” and to add his vocal talents. The group tracked the material directly to tape and bounced it to digital, aiming for a creamier, fuzzier sound.An obvious songwriting centerpiece is “Vampire Love,” which decorates a tale of uncertain romance with stacked backing vocals and delectable synth whooshes. “I wanted to write a love song about a girl who didn’t realize her partner was a vampire,” Haha says, “but I wanted to use ‘Vampire Love’ as a double meaning: it’s that nuance of ‘Am I in a toxic relationship?’ and then realizing, ‘Oh, I’m actually dating a real vampire'”.
The vampires return again as the record peaks with the dynamic, seven-minute epic “Symphony of the Night,” a song that could easily be interpreted as a woman psycho-stalking her ex. On the flip side is “You Can’t Stay”, a track about breaking up with a demon, that serves as a metaphor for breaking up with someone who messes with your head so much, you feel possessed.
Through the cutesy aesthetic and sparkly omnichord tones throughout their tracks, Stretch Panic doesn’t deny the darkness within the human experience. They embrace it, with kazoos and cathartic energy. You can dig deeper if you please, but even if you stick with the campy fantasy-horror vibe, Glitter & Gore remains a quirky treasure box of Halloween treats.
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At various points in the decade or so that the Durham, North Carolina collective The Pinkerton Raid has been in existence, frontman Jesse James DeConto has been joined in the band by members of his family. It makes sense then that the band’s latest two-sided single draws inspiration from those close family ties.
DeConto, now joined in The Pinkerton Raid by bassist Jon DePue and drummer Scott McFarlane, penned the thunderous A-side “Cinnamon Sweet” as a nod to a playful nickname he has for his wife. The song warns any would-be paramours off trying to corral the dynamic titular girl: “Her curves are not for your caress/Eyes up, my friend, you know how this ends.”
The unspoken context derived from his wife’s ire about being catcalled and harassed on the street. “What is cinnamon?” DeConto asks by way of explaining the song. “It’s sweet and hot at the same time, burns your lips. I started thinking about that as a metaphor for this fire for justice in her, not willing to put up with it anymore and finding a voice to put these guys in their place when they objectified her. Watching my wife find empowerment in this #MeToo movement.”
As for the engaging B-side “Au Cheval,” the title came from a Chicago restaurant with a famously desirable cheeseburger. And the seize-the-day ethos (“Suck the marrow from the bone”) comes from DeConto’s adventurous younger brother, whose willingness to wait hours in line for said cheeseburger provided evidence of his joie de vivre.
“He’s just a person who tries to get the most out of life,” DeConto explains. “He enjoys a lot of things that other people might see as extravagant or risky or decadent. There’s not a burger in the world I would wait four hours for. It just captured who he is, that he would appreciate this special experience that other people wouldn’t have time for. It symbolized going after it, the decadence and the risk-taking, not wanting to miss out on the fullness of life.”
Fans of The Pinkerton Raid might notice a bit of a departure on these and other recent singles relative to the band’s last full-length, 2018’s Where The Wildest Spirits Fly, a mellower affair. The band’s upcoming album promises more of the ground-shaking, hip-swaying sounds found on these tracks, which were produced by David Wimbish.
“That record ended up being pretty folky and trying to fit into that early 70s pop-folk vein of people like Cat Stevens or Simon & Garfunkel, certainly the Beatles,” DeConto says of Where The Wildest Spirits Fly. “It was very openly and consciously trying to sound classic. I was happy with how that turned out, but I didn’t feel that pressure anymore. I did that thing. With this upcoming record, I think it was more let’s just see where each individual song takes us. Where it took is us is something that’s much more aggressive and more physical. Something that is dynamic in a more muscular way and not so much built on the gentle swells and recessions of folk music. It’s more rocking and more danceable.”
“I think that has a lot to do with playing for enough years together with Jon and Scott. We just developed more playing together. I think any time you’re a singer/songwriter, especially if you gravitate as I do toward classic melody, there are tried and true ways for a rhythm section to fit into that. But I think with this one, I let them push me a little more out of the singer/songwriter mold and more to what we want to sound like as a band. I also developed my interest and my skills as an electric guitar player during that time. It gave me more colors to paint with than I had before.”
Yet even as The Pinkerton Raid branches out with these exciting new tracks, Jesse James DeConto won’t forget his heritage. “I developed as a musician playing with my family in early adulthood,” he says. “That definitely has shaped me. I feel like my human identity is shaped by my relationships and that comes out in songs. This particular batch of songs has manifested that in a much clearer way. This is the fifth record that I’m making here. I’ve definitely written songs about family members before, but never a whole batch like this.”
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Moments into Coma Girls’ self-titled debut album, on the jangly opening anthem “Car Alarms,” ringleader Chris Spino announces, as if through a megaphone: “And the world… The world is a giant casino.” 5 years later, the L.A. rockers are still making ambitious and colorful music, but reality has settled in. They’re offering Skyboxer, an extravagant yet complex EP that’s given up gambling and instead chooses to face life head-on.
Coma Girls formed in 2014 in Atlanta, and they’ve since come a long way and travelled through a myriad of sonic (and geographical) territories to get to where they are now. After Spino sold his belongings and moved to L.A. with a backpack full of clothes and a guitar, he was committing himself to music wholly as if in marriage. “Music is always the best therapy for me,” he says, though that’s fairly clear in his songs—the urgency and the vitality are palpable.
Their debut received praise from Immersive Atlanta for “show[ing] a surprising unity and identity,” and Skyboxer takes that to the next level. Featuring an all-star cast of Spino’s friends, the EP watches his ideas manifest through the talent of seven other musicians as well as his own: Spino himself on vocals, guitar & piano; Travis Popichak on drums; Marvin Figueroa on bass; Dan Gee on keys; Adam Laidlaw on guitar; Michika Skyy on backing vocals; and Connor “Catfish” Gallaher, whose talents can be heard on records from The Black Lips, Tim Heidecker & Weyes Blood, and more on pedal steel. Producing, engineering, and mixing is Tomas Dolas (Oh Sees, SASAMI, Mr. Elevator and the Brain Hotel).
“It really turns into a sonic circus,” Spino says of the EP. Though Coma Girls have never subscribed to a specific genre, its heart has always belonged to pop—Spino’s guilty pleasure. It explains the catchy, indulgent atmosphere of their self-titled LP; on Skyboxer, however, it’s not as evident. “I think this is an effort to bend that a little bit and push it into territory that gets stranger and feels bigger and explores different sounds,” Spino says, and then adds: “but it also retains what Coma Girls has always been about—pop songs.”
The country twang comes through in songs like “Pasadena” and “Wedding Roses.” Spino’s love for folk spans all the way from Bob Dylan to Conor Oberst, and these wistful ballads reflect the melancholic nature of the genre as the lyrics reckon with the complications of being human. “I had a lot of depression sink in,” Spino says about his time spent travelling back and forth between his new home in L.A. and his family in Georgia during the making of this EP. There were funerals, heart attacks, old lovers, unsettled issues—a whirlwind of serious shit that transformed Coma Girls from a carefree party into an introspective journey. The songs are still striking—and when Spino describes them, he can’t stop using the adjective “big”—because the emotions are colossal, and the energy intense.
With his orchestra of friends, Spino was not alone in his musical ruminations. “We were able to explore each song differently,” he says, “but give it a common thread as well.” This collective way of creating yields a diverse, powerful piece of art that anyone can listen to or relate to. “It’s supposed to take you places,” he says. “It’s more like a form of escapism.” Skyboxer offers nearly 17 minutes of a safe hideaway from reality, where the listener can drift through a new, all-encompassing world.
The upside to the national lockdown is that it’s forced everyone into a meditative state, which Spino appreciates greatly. With clean time and therapy, he became more articulate and ready to create than ever. “It’s not conducive to my creativity to be up until the sun comes up every day,” he explains. “I’ve done more in the past six months than I have in the past five years. I’ve been insanely productive.” After this EP, there’s a lot more to come from Coma Girls.
“With its cutting lyrics and gauzy layers of sound, “Paul Pretzel” is at once wound and bandage. … Spino’s vocal delivery walks the razor’s edge between genuine devastation and sardonic self-deprecation.” – Spill Magazine
“The bar rock album for the person who doesn’t like bar rock, the pop album for the person who doesn’t like pop.” – Immersive Atlanta
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Austin, Texas indie-rock/garage-punk outfit Parker Woodland is a band born both by chance and by calling. What began with neighbors jamming in a small church soon evolved into a powerful, sweat-soaked live experience in packed rock clubs. At the center of it all is songwriter/vocalist/bassist Erin Walter, a Unitarian Universalist minister and activist in the Girls Rock Camp scene, unabashedly expressive frontwoman for whom Parker Woodland represents the realization of a lifelong dream.
“A big part of Parker Woodland is about creating community, everybody jumping up on stage together, grinning, flailing,” says Walter. “Having a crew to make music and art with is life-giving. I’ve always dreamed of songwriting, and something about playing with these friends, at this time, finally brought it out of me, fiercely.”
Parker Woodland is in the midst of a unique 50-city virtual tour (including churches, a peace benefit with Willie Nelson, a women’s conference, and get-out-the-vote events), preparing to release their debut EP, The World’s On Fire (and We Still Fall In Love). The four-song collection pulses with life-affirming energy, fuzzy riffs, and catchy, shout-along vocals. Though Walter’s lyrics electrify the soul of the EP, Parker Woodland remains a collective effort. Dan McMonigle, a Berklee music grad with a haunting guitar sound, and drummer/DJ/artist Ralph Cutler, a New York transplant, round out the group, bringing a mood and musicality that complement the urgency of Walter’s messages. Prior to the pandemic, various Austin indie luminaries would join Parker Woodland on stage for “The World’s on Fire” finale at each live show.
To record their debut EP, the trio teamed up with renowned producer/engineer Jonas Wilson at his studio The Pink Room and cut the whole record in a single day in August 2019. “This EP is a ‘seize the moment’ record,” says Walter. “We recorded it about a week before we played our first show, so it really captures the moment that Parker Woodland was born.”
The songs have taken on deeper meaning for the band and its fans in light of the epic trials of 2020. Thematically, The World’s On Fire (and We Still Fall In Love) explores the paradox of finding love, joy, and purpose within a crumbling social framework. The EP’s title track tackles these concepts head-on, with Walter rallying against forces of division, proclaiming, “But there’s one thing I know, it’s this / opposites do coexist / and the last thing they’ll ever kill is the love.”
Elsewhere on the record, the group confronts death as “Later Than We Think” and “Hit By A Bus” reflect on the love we give to ourselves and others in the face of our own mortality. “Later Than We Think” is inspired by the last words between Walter’s father and his sister: “It’s later than we think, so love yourself.”
“Hit By A Bus” imagines calling up an old friend, only to be told they have died. The chorus — “If I die tomorrow / please just don’t forget to sing” — is an admonition to live life to the fullest and share it with others, a sentiment at the center of Walter’s humanist ministry. “One of the things I believe in very strongly is that we should let each other in,” says Walter. “Literally: let people into your home, or at least your yard with a mask on these days. And figuratively: share your truth, your struggles.” The video for lead single “The World’s On Fire (and We Still Fall in Love)” demonstrates this ethic to DIY perfection. Shot/directed by Austin artist/musicians Jazz Mills and Cole Burris, it immortalizes the last party Walter threw in her house before the pandemic, full of adults and kids dancing, singing, playing Twister, making pancakes, and covering the house in bubbles, wigs, and glitter. “I watch the video now and I suppose I could feel sad, since we can’t all be together right now,” Walter says. “But what I really feel is grateful and determined, like I know what we’re fighting for.”
Walter laments that it can be a struggle to explain her dual identity as a reverend and a rock musician. But it was partly her work as an interfaith chaplain that gave her the confidence to finally front her own band, after years of playing bass in other people’s projects. “When you go to seminary, you really dig deep into your beliefs, what you want to say, what you’re here for,” says Walter. “This band reflects that — the combination of Dan’s, Ralph’s and my shared love of indie, punk and even pop and country music plus my mission to inspire and care for people. When you write a song, that’s often where you discover what you really believe. I believe life is short, beautiful, and hard, and we will get through it together.”
“Cathartic…fast and optimistic.” – BTRtoday
“Songs about finding joy in the midst of world-crumbling chaos. Who knew it would be so fitting?!” – KUTX
“Propulsive indie-rock.” – Austin American Statesman
“Sounds like something Joan Jett might have bashed out in a jam session with Fountains of Wayne.” – Columbia Daily Tribune