Band: The Drums
Album: Jonny
VÖ: 13.10.2023
Label: ANTI-/ Indigo
Website: http://thedrums.com/
The Drums haben offiziell "Jonny" angekündigt, das sechste Studioalbum des Gründungsmitglieds Jonny Pierce, das am 13. Oktober 2023 über ANTI-Records erscheinen wird. Herzzerreißend, verspielt, laut und heiter zugleich, ist Jonny ein Werk, das sich mit dem tief verwurzelten Kindheitstrauma auseinandersetzt, das Pierce beim Aufwachsen in einer kultähnlichen religiösen Gemeinschaft im Hinterland von New York erlebte, und über den langen Schatten triumphiert, den es jahrelang auf sein Leben und seine Beziehungen warf. Zusammen mit der heutigen Ankündigung erscheint "Better": der neueste Song aus dem Projekt, der eine schimmernde Hook über den Text legt, in dem es darum geht, aus der Co-Abhängigkeit auszubrechen und sich wieder in die verlässlichen Arme der Einsamkeit zurückzuziehen.
"JONNY" HIER VORBESTELLEN
"Als ich 'Jonny' fertigstellte, hörte ich es mir an und hörte, wie sich meine Seele in mir spiegelte", sagt Pierce über die Platte. "Sie ist niederschmetternd und triumphierend, sie ist verloren und gefunden, sie ist verwirrt und sicher, sie ist weise und töricht. Es ist männlich und weiblich, es ist hart und sanft. Wenn man sein ganzes Selbst in einem Album zusammenfasst, wenn man jeden Teil von sich selbst ehrt - selbst die Teile, die sich widersprüchlich anfühlen - dann ist das etwas zutiefst Menschliches, und da meine Religion der Humanismus ist, wird das Album für mich zu einem heiligen Ort der Anbetung. Jedes Gefühl ist eine andere Kirchenbank, jeder Song eine Hymne an das menschliche Herz."
Auf Jonny überwindet Pierce nicht nur die Dunkelheit, die ihn in seiner Kindheit verfolgte, und die daraus resultierende Unwürdigkeit, die noch jahrzehntelang nachwirkte - er erlöst sie und liebt sie für das, was sie war. Dabei fördert die Platte ein wahres Gefühl der Hoffnung, des Optimismus und der Freude zutage, das die meiste Zeit seines Lebens nur hinter seinen Fingerspitzen existiert hat. Jonny umarmt das Chaos des Lebens in all seinen Facetten und lädt dazu ein, all die harten Linien aufzulösen, die uns von uns selbst und im weiteren Sinne auch voneinander trennen - um unsere Schale aufzuweichen und etwas Zärtlichkeit hereinzulassen. Immer auf der Suche nach dem Gleichgewicht zwischen schmerzhafter Melancholie und unwiderstehlicher Pop-Sensibilität, blickt Pierce auf dem Album durch ein Kaleidoskop aus schimmernden Gitarren, Hall, modularen Synthesizern und Drumcomputern: eine klangliche Identität, die seit ihrem Erscheinen vor 15 Jahren einzigartig und ganz und gar The Drums ist.
Jonny ist ein Liebesbrief an eine ganze Reihe von Pierce' jüngeren Ichs. Das Kleinkind, das ein lebensveränderndes Trauma erlitt; der Teenager, der reflexartig einen Panzer gegen die Außenwelt aufbaute; der Bühnenkünstler; der Tänzer; der Liebhaber. Jede Version von sich selbst, von der er die meiste Zeit seines Lebens das Gefühl hatte, nie genug zu sein. In Tracks wie "Better", dem kürzlich erschienenen "Obvious", "I Want It All" und "Plastic Envelope / Protect Him Always" ist das Album voll von selbstreflektierenden Indie-Pop-Songs sowie einer Reihe von minutenlangen Vignetten, die das Album in sanfter Introspektion erden, während Pierce direkt zu seinem jüngeren Ich singt.
Der Longplayer ist eine Rückbesinnung auf ein ganzes Leben, sogar auf das intime Album- und Single-Artwork - eine Reihe von nackten Selbstporträts, die er vor zehn Jahren bei der Rückkehr in sein Elternhaus in New York aufgenommen hat. Als er das Bedürfnis verspürte, eines Tages in den Bundesstaat zu fahren, weil er wusste, dass seine Eltern im Gottesdienst sein würden, machte er ein Foto in Gebetshaltung auf dem Bürostuhl seines Vaters in der Kirche und an anderen Orten im Haus, an denen ihm als Kind etwas Bedeutendes oder Traumatisches widerfahren war. Es war eine Erfahrung, die er in dem Moment nicht verstehen konnte, geschweige denn mit der Außenwelt teilen konnte, aber das Gefühl, seinen nackten Körper in die Räume zu stellen, in denen andere ihm so oft das Gefühl der Ohnmacht gegeben hatten, war ein Triumph, den er Jahre später bei der Entstehung von Jonny entdecken sollte.
THE DRUMS - “JONNY” TRACKLIST
I Want It All
Isolette
I’m Still Scared
Better
Harms
Little Jonny
Plastic Envelope
Protect Him Always
Be Gentle
Dying
Green Grass
Obvious
The Flowers
Teach My Body
Pool God
I used to Want To Die
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Band: The Drums
Album: Brutalism
VÖ: 05.04.2019
Label: ANTI-/ Indigo
Website: http://thedrums.com/
On Brutalism, the fifth LP from The Drums, a lot is different. It is quite possibly the best collection of songs in the band's ten-year career. The album is defined by growth, transformation and questions, but It doesn't provide all the answers. Brutalism is a form of simplistic architecture defined by blocks of raw concrete. Brutalism is rooted in an emotional rawness but its layers are soft, intricate and warm, full of frivolous and exquisitely crafted pop songs that blast sunlight and high energy in the face of anxiety, solitude and crippling self-doubt.
In 2017, The Drums put out its first record as a solo project. Abysmal Thoughts belonged to Jonny Pierce alone. It discussed his painful divorce. Since, he has returned to New York and now lives between there and LA. “I felt my work in LA was done. I was exhausted, depleted and sabotaging myself, partying so much but in reality running away from pain. It was a downward spiral.” He wanted to deal with unresolved facets of his relationship with himself so he did therapy. “It was do or die,” he says. “Figuring out what it is that makes me happy, and acknowledging that I deal with depression.” He looks at Brutalism as an extension of self-care. “In order to take care of yourself you have to ask questions. Those are the things I needed to confront. It's interesting talking about the past, dealing with things that are long overdue. I'm delivering something unsure and unclear.”
Even the fact that Brutalism sounds intentional, focused and efficient is a symbol of how Pierce's prioritizing of his own health and wellbeing has bled into how he makes music. For the making of this album, between his lake house in Upstate New York and a studio in Stinson Beach, California, Pierce was more open than ever, keeping his control freakery at bay, working with others to produce and record the album. He brought in Chris Coady (Beach House, Future Islands, Amen Dunes) to mix it. If there was a guitar part he wanted to write but couldn't play, he brought in a guitarist. It's also the first Drums record with a live drummer. Delegating freed up Pierce's time to produce a more specific vision.
His intentions were rooted in pop, as they've always been. Back in The Drums' previous iterations, however, the pressure was on Pierce to maintain the innocent and nostalgic sound of this surf-pop indie band and it didn't allow him to explore sex, drug use, darker emotions or how he felt currently. Abysmal Thoughts was the first occasion he had chance to do that. Lyrically Brutalism is another giant step in that direction. It's much more cut-throat. “I think there's a parental advisory sticker on the cover!” laughs Pierce. “I didn't have the courage to stand up for what I wanted before. I felt I had to keep things whimsical and that's not who I am. It feels empty.” Sonically he had been devoid of external influences, so afraid of being accused of losing the purism of The Drums' sound. Now he's rediscovering music: everything from SOPHIE to 90s band Whale. They inspired the loop-based, breakbeat drums on 'Kiss It Away' and 'Body Chemistry'. “I used to think our songs sounded like they were held together by scotch tape. These are more bulletproof.”
Every track on the album is a standout. 'Body Chemistry' is the most infectious, a song about learning how to not escape in other people. “I think you can't be intelligent and not be a little bit sad,” says Pierce, of his own permanent rain cloud above his head. '626 Bedford Avenue' does what the best pop songs do: it alerts the nostalgia cog in your brain. It's a familiar melody that you think you've heard before, which works given the context of looking back on a specific time and place. 'Brutalism' is about a love so intense you feel destroyed by it. Pierce tends to find himself loving in a very extreme way that's almost harmful. 'Loner' documents the painful process of healing. “I don't want to be alone and I am scared of all the people in the world,” he sings about not knowing how to socialize. A reassuring thing has been in rediscovering that Pierce was building a community in the intricate relationships he has with listeners. Now that he's alone in this project it's even more apparent.
“That's the one thing that's kept me going through this,” he says. Brutalism is defined by vulnerability. It is truly pop at its core with thoroughly modern production. “I love pop but I feel that there's a sensitivity that's missing,” he says of the landscape. Pierce wants to sacrifice ego in favor of tenderness. “I wanted to make a pop record where I'm not declaring how great I am,” he laughs. “I'm questioning if I could ever be great? I'm a grown man saying: ' I feel more crazy than ever. I feel lost. I'm terrified of the future.'” With 'Blip Of Joy' he ends on a note of hope. “I hope that one day I won't deal with depression, that I can love in a way that doesn't feel scary,” he says. That's why you can dance to Brutalism and you can laugh to it too. Even though it's heavy.
In many The Drums has always belonged to Pierce, but it wasn't until 2016 that he reclaimed ownership. Back in 2008 Pierce and his childhood best friend Jacob Graham conceived of a collaboration that was never intended to become what it did. “Jacob and I were writing pop songs. I didn't think anybody would hear it. I recorded it with broken equipment and guitars that were out of tune.” Pierce put it on MySpace and weeks later interest was lining up. “I scrambled and found the first people I could to turn it into a band.” The runaway train lasted four albums. Pierce never felt he belonged. “Sex, drugs, rock'n'roll and hanging with my buds doesn't resonate with me. I never found community in that,” he says. “I was so terrified that if I hit the brakes even for a second everything would fall apart. I was trapped with a sound I wasn't crazy about, stuck in a culture I didn't connect with. I'm finally in my mid 30s starting to take care of myself.”
The past year has been transformative. “I don't think I'll ever really find myself,” he adds. “I don't think people do. I don't think there's a day that you wake up and you go, Now I know who I am. The best way for me to be an artist is by taking a goddamn minute, being still and listening to what it is that I want and need.” It was a real year of growth for him, but growth towards what? “I don't really know, and that's OK.”
Info zum vorherigen Album:
Band: The Drums
Album: Abysmal Thoughts
VÖ: 16.06.2017
Label: ANTI- / Indigo
Website: http://www.thedrums.com/
With The Drums’ new Abysmal Thoughts, band founder Jonny Pierce is making the exact album he’s always held in his heart. Of course, this is The Drums, so that heart is broken—but there’s beauty and even bliss in this kind of heartbreak, as well as that special kind of glorious delirium that comes from taking everything life can throw at you and still walking away triumphant. If Abysmal Thoughts doesn’t sound at all abysmal—really, Pierce has rarely been this irresistibly pop—that’s because this is a story about how to figure out what happiness means once the worst has already happened. “Happiness can be confusing to me,” says Pierce. “It shows up out of nowhere, and before you can even get used to it, it’s vanished.
But Abysmal Thoughts? I can rely on them—and with the political chaos that is raining down, who knows when these dark feelings will subside?” As the last album cycle for the Drums finished and his long-term relationship with his former partner dissolved, Pierce took some time away from music altogether in hopes to reconnect with himself and find future inspiration. Determined to make a change, he ended up leaving his longtime home in New York and found himself isolated in a large empty apartment in Los Angeles, all his plans for life and love suddenly in shambles: “I said I wanted to let life happen?” he says. “Well, the universe listened and life began to fuck me right up the ass! But honestly, I make the worst art when I’m comfortable. The stuff that resonates with me the longest—and that resonates with others—is always the stuff that comes out of my hardships and confusion.”
That hardship and confusion—and the clarity of personality and purpose it inspired—became Abysmal Thoughts, an unflinching autobiography with Pierce back in full control of the band. He’s back to not just writing all the songs by himself but playing every instrument, too, this time realizing exactly his own personal vision for the band. Not coincidentally, it’s some of the most revelatory work he’s ever done. The key was opener “Mirror,” and from there, Thoughts simply flowed: “It very much felt like I was releasing,” Pierce says. “I had this visual of turning a handle and watching steam just pour out of the valve, relieving a lot of my artistic and personal anxiety. I was dealing with so much loss and feeling unsure and scared—and if there’s one thing I can rely on it’s the healing power of being an artist. I’m falling back in love with music. Creating this album on my own was a full-on long- running therapy session.”
Across a year and three months of home recording—with the same guitar, synthesizer, drum machine and reverb unit he’s played since the beginning of The Drums—Pierce put together Thoughts, first in that apartment in Los Angeles and then later in his cabin in upstate New York. With help from engineer Jonathan Schenke (Parquet Courts, Mannequin Pussy and more) he gave Thoughts a pop sensibility that added color and contrast to an already vivid self-portrait alive with the hyperdramatic emotional potency of the Smiths, the arch literary pop moves of New Zealanders like the Verlaines and the Clean, and the riotous clatter-punk power of the UK DIY bands of 1979. And this time around he’s introduced a slight influence from early drum and bass as well, drawn from his adoration of Roni Size and other electronic artists from the UK in the 1990s.
Now the highs are higher than ever, and the lows absolutely bottomless, and it’s the last song—the title track—that makes everything clear. The Drums are back, and while there’s a heavy sadness here, Pierce is stronger for fighting through it. On possibly the loveliest and catchiest song he’s got, Pierce takes his listeners to the edge of the cliff, and then drops everything but his voice, singing “Abysmal, abysmal, abysmal ...” Some albums might offer a happy ending—even some albums by The Drums—but here Pierce just offers an ending. Because that’s more honest, isn’t it?
“There’s something in me that mostly prefers a sad ending,” he says. “The other potential title I had was A Blip Of Joy, the opposite of Abysmal Thoughts—if those two things don’t sum up the emotional chaos that I feel every day, then nothing will! But Abysmal Thoughts wins because ... doesn’t it always?”
