 | Automatic Signal Stones Throw |
| Like all the best bands, Automatic came together organically. Izzy Glaudini (synths, vocals), Lola Dompé (drums, vocals) and Halle Saxon (bass, vocals) met while immersed in LA’s DIY band scene and started jamming together in 2017. Gaining notoriety for their explosive live shows, they were invited to share the stage with bands like Surfbort, Wand and Flatworms. Lola was born into a punk household (her father is Kevin Haskins of Bauhaus) and joined her first band, art-rock outfit Blackblack, when she was just 13. Halle and Izzy met playing in local bands in Northeast LA; Izzy was a guitarist and vocalist, and Halle liked to plug her fretless bass into a guitar amp. Uninspired by the masculine energy of the local scene and rock music on the radio — “pumped out like plastic bottles into the ocean” — Izzy ditched the guitar for a synth, and in 2017 she and Halle joined forces with Lola. They named themselves Automatic after a song by the Go-Go’s — the only all-female band to have written and played instruments on an album to reach #1 in the US. Automatic’s guitar-less setup felt like a palate cleanser, and as they played together, they began feeling empowered taking up space in the scene. They honed their sound, tying together their taste for dub reggae, motorik rhythms and gnarly synth work inspired by Neu! and Suicide with a cinematic pop sensibility. Working with engineer and producer Joo Joo Ashworth (of FROTH), they started fleshing out their GarageBand demos, and their debut album ‘Signal’ started to take root. Their first single ‘Calling It’ captures the sensation of being adrift in a wide-open space and the desire to rip it all up and start over. Elsewhere on Signal, songs speak directly to the band members’ experiences: ‘Humanoid’ and ‘Too Much Money’ are observations of boredom, unhappiness and the disappointing falseness of social media personas, while ‘Signal’ is about being “trapped in the drudgery of a shitty life/job, and the realization that nobody is going to rescue you from it but yourself.” A shocking near-death freak accident in her apartment inspired Izzy to write ‘Electrocution’ — an experience alluded to on the album art, which depicts a switch on a red background. The video for 'Too Much Money,' directed by SAMSONITE, is a lo-fi journey around Los Angeles through the eyes of a Bowie-inspired photographer and features many LA faces, including Oh Sees frontman John Dwyer. Izzy studied film at college and Halle used to work at cult video store Kim's Video in NYC, and the band also counts film as an important influence on their music. In particular, David Lynch and Dario Argento’s fingerprints are all over Signal’s ambiguous lyrics and eerie atmospheres. Tying ‘Signal’ together is a sense of anxiety and alienation so common to the 21st-century experience, a feeling of being at an angle to the world. As they put it: “The world is so fucked up, I don’t know how any musician could say, ‘This is all peachy.’” 2019 Tour Dates: 11-13 October - Perris, CA @ Desert Daze 17 October - Paris, France @ Mains D'oeuvres 18 October – Lille, France @ L'Aéronef 19 October - Groningen, Netherlands @ Vera 20 October - Eindhoven, Netherlands @ DDW Music Festival 22 October - London, UK @ Shacklewell Arms 23 October - Bristol, UK @ The Lanes 25 October - Amsterdam, Netherlands @ London Calling Festival 28 October - Berlin, Germany @ Urban Spree 29 October - Antwerp, Belgium @ Trix 7 November - Austin, TX @ Levitation* 8 November - Oklahoma City, OK @ 89th Street OKC^ 9 November - Memphis, TN @ Hi Tone^ 10 November - Nashville, TN @ The Basement^ 12 November - Columbus, OH @ Oberlin College^ 13 November - State College, PA @ Webster's^ 14 November - Oberlin, OH @ Oberlin College^ 16 November - Montreal, QC @ Bar Le Ritz^ 19 November - Hamden, CT @ Space Ballroom^ 20 November - Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts^ 21 November - Baltimore, MD @ Metro Gallery^ 22 November - New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom^ 24 November - Washington, DC @ Black Cat^ * = w/ Angel Olsen, Kikagaku Moyo, Black Marble, Holy Wave and more ^ = w/ Black Marble 'Signal' Debut album by Automatic Out September 27th Stones Throw Records | |
No comments:
Post a Comment