ISSUE 45 JULY 2020 READDORK.COM
DOWN WITH BORING
HAIM
NO B O DY AS KE D. W E D I D I T A N Y WAY .
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INDEX
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July 2020 | readdork.com | Down With Boring
26
Ø4
Intro 26
Features
16
Hype 58
Incoming
** BAND INDEX ** BAND INDEX **
Alfie Templeman 50 KennyHoopla
ED’S LETTER
HAIM
After a year of new tracks, Haim are finally ready to drop their third album. This time, they’re putting it all out there.
34
With her much anticipated second full-length, there’s no stopping Phoebe Bridgers now.
38
GLASS ANIMALS
A lot can happen in just four years, and Glass Animals have been through more than their fair share.
With ‘RTJ4’, band of the moment have released their most laser-focused, highintensity record yet.
16
Best Ex Blossoms Bombay Bicycle Club
BENEE
DREAM WIFE
One of punk-stroke-rockstroke-pop’s most ferocious and well-loved bands, Dream Wife’s second album is no holds barred.
BTS
46
7
Charli XCX
LOVE FAME TRAGEDY
It’s time for the debut album from Murph ‘from the Wombats’: Love Fame Tragedy has arrived.
5Ø
MXMTOON
Everyone’s favourite bedroom pop teen mxmtoon is making her mark with new EP combo, ‘dawn’ and ‘dusk’.
Christopher Cross
31
Crack Cloud
19
Creeper
38
54
Dead Pony
S tephen
Vistas are saving a washout summer with an album chock-full of feel good indie vibes.
‘EDITOR’ @STEPHENACKROYD
15, 47
Olivia Dean
17 44, 47
Phoebe Bridgers
31
Pizzagirl
10
Powfu
16
19 Rolling Blackouts CF
Drug Store Romeos
11, 48
11 Run The Jewels 47 Silverbacks 11
FKA Twigs
Soccer Mommy
Fontaines DC
31 Soko 15 Sorry
Georgia
15 Sports Team
47
Honey Lung
15 15 9
7, 15, 20
31 The Academic 15, 19
15, 47
Hinds
19 48
Glass Animals 13, 15 The 1975 Greta Thunberg
13 19
Sinead O’Brien
Everything Everything
IDER
VISTAS
11 18
Rina 31 Sawayama 15, 40, 47
Cutty Ranks
Hayley Williams
19
Orlando 15, 49 Weeks
Empress Of
46
14
15 Moses Sumney
Brad Stank
New Zealand pop sensation Benee is taking off after the runaway success of her breakthrough hit.
42
Arlo Parks
The Aces
34, 48
The Big Moon
The Howl 46 & The Hum 7 The Temptations
15 48 31
Jack Garratt
46 Tim Healy
31
Jade Hairpins
46 Vistas
48
Jehnny Beth
46 Walt Disco
15
Katie Malco
47 Weird Milk
13
Kelly Lee Owens
12 Westerman
48
ON THE DORK STEREO THIS MONTH... DECLAN MCKENNA
Zeros
Our Deccers’ long-awaited second album is everything we could have wanted and much, much more. The boy wonder may have been replaced by a slightly younger version now (hi, Alfie Templeman, 17), but his prodigal son of indie status remains intact.
THE MAGIC GANG
The Death of the Party
Delayed but soon to hit the airwaves, The Magic Gang’s second full-length is the infectious, melodic masterpiece we all expect.
BLOXX
Lie Out Loud Everyone loves a bit of indie, right? That’s exactly what
you’re getting a 100% proof shot of on Bloxx’s debut. The Dork faves sound every bit as glorious, immediate and anthemic as you’d expect. One to get excited by.
SPORTS TEAM
Deep Down Happy Here’s the thing, Dear Reader. When you’ve collectively bought about 700 bundles of Sports Team’s debut album in
order to help them try to get a UK Album Chart number one, and then you’ve also ended up buying downloadable copies on every conceivable platform in the last couple of hours in order to give it that final push, you feel you have to listen to it Quite A Lot to get your money’s worth. Good job it’s a great record, eh? The true number two of our hearts.
READDORK.COM
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PHOEBE BRIDGERS
It’s been a strange old year so far, Dear Reader. Yeah - I know - so much, so obvious. While the world went on pause, and then quickly felt to fall apart around our ears, there’s been a lot going on. Much of it very, very important indeed. But on the other hand, a lot hasn’t been happening, too: no live music, no festivals, no seeing your mates at a show, no getting excited about putting plans in the diary, and - to an extent - less new music out there to enjoy. As artists shifted release dates back to cope with the everchanging landscape, we’ve had some great records arrive over the last few months, but others made the call to reschedule to a point where hopefully they’d have chance to get their proverbial ducks in a row. Thankfully, it feels like this month is the one where the floodgates open. Cover stars Haim return with an album perfectly capable of saving the summer, while Phoebe Bridgers’ second full-length is doubtlessly one of the records of the year to date. Run The Jewels’ much anticipated ‘RTJ4’ also gets that tag, with added heft and importance given current world events. Dork faves Dream Wife and Glass Animals are providing some riotously good fun, while Murph ‘from The Wombats’ continues to provide bitter-sweet distractions with his Love Fame Tragedy solo project. The world may be burning, but the soundtrack is great.
RUN THE JEWELS
6, 47
19 Larry Pink The Human 15 LAV 46 Matt Bellamy 11 Mealtime
Aluna
Ø4
15
8 LA Priest
ALMA
INTRO
DMA’S p. 8
THE BEATING HEART OF POP.
walking in With ‘RTJ4’, band of the moment RUN THE JEWELS have released their most laser-focused, high-intensity record yet. “We want every punch to land,” the duo explain.
4
Words: Jake Hawkes. Photos: Tim Saccenti.
JULY 2020
DORK
GRAND PAX p. 10
THE ACADEMIC p. 12
LIME CORDIALE p. 14
n the snow 5 READDORK.COM
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COVER STORY
JULY 2020
DORK
HAIM
27
After a year of new tracks, some release date shuffling and a world full of uncertainty buzzing around them, HAIM are finally ready to drop their third album. This time, they’re putting it all out there. Words: Abigail Firth.
READDORK.COM
34
I See JULY 2020
DORK
PHOEBE BRIDGERS
e You 35
With a cast of collaborations that reads like a who’s who of modern alternative music and a debut album drowning in a sea of critical acclaim, PHOEBE BRIDGERS is finally ready to deliver a follow-up. No matter what the world throws up, there’s no stopping her now. Words: Ali Shutler. Photos: Olof Grind.
READDORK.COM
38 JULY 2020
DORK
A lot can happen in just four years, and GLASS ANIMALS have been through more than their fair share. Words: Jessica Goodman.
group triumphed on tour, stirred up a gleeful sense of hype when they inadvertently caused pineapples to be banned from festivals, and everything looked to be coming up Ass Glanimals. Until July 2018, when Joe was hit by a truck while riding his bike in Dublin, an accident that left him fighting for his life. Thinking back to that time in their lives isn’t easy. The conversation is hard. Dave speaks carefully, but candidly, reflecting back on one of the worst times of his life with openness. He wasn’t in the same country as his bandmate when the accident happened. When he heard, he got the first flight he could to be there for his friend and his family. “When I was landing [Joe’s dad] called me and I could hear it in his voice how much he was worried,” he recalls. “I could just feel it. He was trying to keep it cool, but he wasn’t – and he’s a serious man,” he states. “I’ve seen Joe’s dad cry twice: once when we played him the song ‘Agnes’ off the last record, and then once in that circumstance - that’s it.” The accident left Joe with a severely broken leg and brain damage caused by a complex skull fracture. “It was bad,” Dave conveys. “I’d done a few years of medical school, and I was really into neuroscience, and I kind of knew how bad it was. I could see it.” Understanding the gravity of the situation didn’t make it any easier to handle. “I was trying to play it down,” he recalls. “I was like, ‘oh, he’s gonna be okay, it’s gonna be okay’. But deep inside, you know...” He trails off before he admits, “it could have really gone either way. It was actually probably a lot more likely that he was going to suffer from some kind of issues the rest of his life. He couldn’t talk. He couldn’t walk. He couldn’t really move, at all.” He pauses. “And then he had a miracle surgery.” The road to recovery hasn’t been easy. Joe had to re-learn how to walk, how to talk, how to read, to write, to do the most basic things, and build onwards from there. “He started just saying one word at a time,” Dave recalls, then grins. “His first words were ‘I’ and ‘fuck!’” he exclaims, laughing. “Then he got ‘you’ and ‘me’ and it just
READDORK.COM
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SOME PEOPLE LIKE PLAYING VIDEO GAMES, I LIKE MAKING MUSIC,” DAVE BAYLEY SHRUGS. “It’s weird that it’s a job.” Making music has never been considered one of the most viable of career paths, but for Glass Animals it feels like part of who they are. The road that brought them here hasn’t been an easy one, but with new album ‘Dreamland’ about to be released, the four-piece are making the most of their ability to keep doing what they do best. “We’ve done some stupid stuff,” Dave laughs, grinning fondly all the while. “We shouldn’t be alive right now. It’s very lucky that we’re all here.” The sun is shining in London. Holed up in his home studio, where he’s been spending his time through lockdown, the frontman is in high spirits. “I spend most of my life in here anyway,” he shrugs as he gestures around the room, “making music, so it’s kind of back to that.” He pauses, then laughs. “It’s weird when I leave.” With the world in the middle of a global pandemic, and the country in a state of lockdown, these are strange and difficult times we’re living in. For a band who put so much of their creativity into their live performances, the current hiatus the live industry is going through has hit them hard. “We were on tour in America, and I was ready for two years of touring after that,” Dave conveys. “We’d basically pushed ‘go’ on the big plan.” Midway through a tour of small venues, building up to a mini-festival show at Red Rocks in Colorado with the likes of friend and collaborator Denzel Curry on the bill, the group were deep into creating something “trippy and theatrical” on stage to announce their new record when the COVID-19 outbreak forced them to put all their plans on hold. “I was in tour mode, super heavily in tour mode,” Dave recalls. “It was all based around touring.” Their last album, ‘How To Be A Human Being’, saw the band – completed by drummer Joe Seaward, guitarist Drew MacFarlane, and bassist Ed Irwin-Singer – earn no shortage of acclaim both on and off the tour circuit. The record was Mercury Prize-nominated. One of their singles spawned a mobile video game. The
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One of punk-stroke-rock-stroke-pop’s most ferocious and well-loved bands, DREAM WIFE’s second album is no holds barred. Words: Jessica Goodman. Photos: Sarah Piantadosi.
JULY 2020
DORK
DREAM WIFE
43 READDORK.COM
LOVE FAME TRAGEDY
47
It’s time for the debut album from Murph ‘from the Wombats’: LOVE FAME TRAGEDY has arrived. Words: Jack Press.
READDORK.COM
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N F JULY 2020
DORK
Everyone’s favourite bedroom pop teen MXMTOON is making her mark with new EP combo, ‘dawn’ and ‘dusk’.
Words: Jack Press. Photos: April Blum, Cesar Balcazar.
ONCE UPON A TIME IN A PRE-PANDEMIC WORLD, SPENDING HOURS BURROWING AWAY IN YOUR ROOM WAS A PASTIME ACTIVITY RESERVED FOR THE INTROVERTS OF YOUR FRIENDSHIP GROUP, RATHER THAN THE NEW NORMAL. Coming alive in a community of online creatives away from the shackles of their ‘in real life’ selves, a collective of teenagers took their day-to-day struggles out of their heads and onto YouTube recordings, armed with nothing but a songbook of bangers alchemised together in their bedrooms. Over the past few years, the ‘bedroom pop’ phenomenon has shed its rough-and-ready recordings shell in exchange for dreamy lo-fi soundscapes that soundtrack both your summer and your seasonal depression. With artists like Rex Orange County and Soccer Mommy breaking out of their bedrooms and onto global stages, the wave is ready to be ridden as bedroom pop graduates to its next phase. Dork goes one-to-one, bedroom-to-bedroom with one of the genre’s foremost rising stars, mxmtoon, aka Maia, to find out what it’s like to be part of a DIY musical revolution. “I didn’t really think of myself as anything special, I was just making songs in my bedroom and then sharing them. I didn’t think anyone would actually hear them, so I just posted them, but people did hear them. I got to be a part of this really cool wave of musicians,” says Maia, smiling at the thought as she sits back in her bedroom at her parents where her musical journey began. It’s here, in this bedroom, she discovered the artists that would encourage her to pick up her ukulele and press record. “If I hadn’t looked to other musicians like Rex Orange County or Clairo when I started to write music, I don’t know If I ever would have had the courage to post anything online. They made music feel more accessible to me, and it wasn’t something where you had to have a label behind you or all of these things that would push you up behind the scenes in order to achieve a platform. “For me, bedroom pop is honestly so important, and I’m so proud to be a part of that world because I think it’s opened up a door for so many young people to feel like there’s a space to be creative and to post regardless of who is listening.” Being a part of a budding musical revolution such as bedroom pop has given Maia not only the boost to battle her own demons and experience a creative epiphany, but has also allowed her to be part of the wave riding the changing tide. As streaming platforms fortify their dominance and platforms like TikTok tear up the tattered book of music industry codes and conventions in favour of trendsetting dance routines, musicians are having to adapt to a whole new landscape. According to Maia, bedroom pop is the perfect place to be for this. “Music has been something that’s historically always been so gate-kept, making people feel like it’s this invisible entity that exists behind glass doors you can’t open and won’t be able to touch. Bedroom pop has just broken that down and made it feel like anybody can do that. I truly do believe anybody can, and that’s a wonderful thing.” While the bedroom pop revolution
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NO FAK -ER
MXMTOON
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everything
JULY 2020
DORK
VISTAS
changes... VISTAS are saving a washout summer with an album chock-full of feel good indie vibes. Words: Jamie MacMillan. Photos: Niall Lee.
55 READDORK.COM
THE NEW ALBUM
INCLUDES THE SINGLES “SPORTS!” AND “SO WHEN YOU GONNA...”
OUT JULY 3RD