Exsonvaldes – Abandoned Water Park
Where do you go, my lovely, when you’re alone in your bed? And, truthfully, are you ever really alone? I don’t mean to suggest that you ought to develop some nasty case of paranoid delusions, but it feels like solitude is an ever-rarer gift.
It doesn’t take long, we now know, to reassemble the minds of millions of people. It doesn’t take too much encouragement to make them choose convenience. And now, with all the info stuck inside one tiny black rectangle, it’s harder than ever to be alone.
Children and artists are the ones who do the most with solitude and ache for it when they don’t have it. Maybe it’s because they need an empty space into which they can put all of their dreams. That’s what Exsonvaldes is looking for.
“Abandoned Water Park” is a beautiful-sounding indie-pop sound, complete with simply gorgeous vocals in the verse parts of the songs. It’s also a tune where real salvation is obtained, not when you find the people you want to be with, but when you finally find yourself alone, free to think and move in whichever way you want. Some see abandoned places, while Exsonvaldes see an opportunity to dream again.
Fervents – A Letter
It was as close to setting up a religious organisation as you can get without actually asking the government to exempt you from taxes. Loud, guitar-based garage rock gave a place to go on a Saturday night and a spiritual purpose to many.
Boy, the people making it must’ve been pretty smart, right? Surely, they must have had vision boards in their bedrooms and detailed plans drawn on a blackboard? Not really! In fact, the less thinking one did, the better the music seemed to be.
That’s not to say that the original, loud guitar bands didn’t care about anything. They certainly felt the pressure of modern life and used that loud, obnoxious music to tell the world off. That’s exactly what Fervents are doing now in a different time.
Fervents’ “A Letter” sounds like the kind of rock song that bands write once they’re sleep-deprived for days and forced to stare at the evening news. “A Letter” is immediate, aggressive, and quick to tell the world that it can keep its evil, soul-crushing ways to itself. That’s the best defence!
