Sibylline Lover bio

For over a decade now, much of independent and experimental pop has been sequestered to the safety and seclusion of a bedroom, with hushed vocals and reverb-laden instrumentation forming a protective cocoon around the oftentimes solo songwriter. Well, Sibylline Lover is definitely not that.

Born from the creative energies of UGA's Hugh Hodgson School of Music graduate Jason Bronson, Sibylline Lover is a highly collaborative, maximalist recording venture in which friends and former classmates alike utilize a legitimate recording studio to bring Bronson’s compositions to life. Inspired by pop auteurs like The Beach Boys and The Zombies, as well as Athens’ own of Montreal, Bronson has crafted eight songs for his peers — among them, Delorean Gray bandmates Jacob Chisenhall and Freeman Leverett — to flesh out within The Glow, local producer Jesse Mangum’s studio space. 

With two tracks from his forthcoming album complete, the precociously sweet “Clarissa” and the heart achingly grandiose “Winter Isolation”, Bronson is bringing yet more performers together to interpret his tunes. The classically trained composer will be joined by dancers Grace Ferzely and Isabella Dobbins, at Go Bar on Tuesday, September 24 for a spectacle as much ballet as concert. Ferzely and Dobbins will be interpreting Bronson’s two compositions, while Bronson himself will be playing keyboard-based interludes between songs. Ajmal Millar is crafting costumes that will lend performers an appropriately whimsical appearance befitting their musical source material.

Both songs will be available to stream and download on Friday, September 20, with the debut Sibylline Lover full-length album expected to follow sometime in early 2020.

Delorean Gray bio

Escapism has always formed the connective tissue between songwriter Jacob Chisenhall’s music. His last release under the Delorean Gray moniker, Star Tropics, dealt in dreamy sonic reveries, chronicling his protagonist’s interstellar journey to combat the nefarious Aristonauts. Similarly, the bulk of his previous band Fake Flowers’ output — including an unreleased full-length — carved out surreal soundscapes where deep-seeded sorrows and anxieties could go to hide. On his latest album as Delorean Gray, though, the longtime Atlantan sets a course straight for the heart of the struggle, confronting his troubles head-on and shedding the skin of a once apprehensive songwriter. On Otaku Punk, his third release as Delorean Gray, Chisenhall lays bare a tumultuous fallout in his most direct and mature work to date, all wrapped up in the sci-fi sheen of his protagonist’s own adventure.

Otaku Punk was crafted as a contrast piece to Star Tropics, both musically and narratively. The storyline tells of a winter spent in near isolation, mirroring Chisenhall’s own bout with depression, during which he finally came to terms with the dissolution of Fake Flowers. As Delorean and his crew head towards the Aristonaut’s hideout, they enter hibernation chambers to pass the time. Locked into a reality simulation called The Frontier, the team bask in a neon-teamed city devoid of laws and consequence — until the Aristonauts get wise to their plan and hack into their defenseless minds, that is. Now stranded in a hostile virtual wasteland, Delorean must find his crew and escape back to the waking world.

In a landscape full of immaculately crafted digital sounds, Otaku Punk takes a more deconstructive approach, utilizing old-school music gear like Synth Saxophones and digi-drums to create new sounds by recycling older instruments and samples. In comparison to the last album’s lush, low-key gauze, Otaku Punk features more up-tempo tunes filled with glittery synths, channeling influence from new wave, R&B, and even metal. Gary Numan, Devo, and the Cure were all sources of inspiration.

On top of Chisenhall’s own new approaches to songwriting, frequent collaborator Freeman Leverett and recent Delorean Gray addition Jason Bronson are now fixtures in the live band, and as such, their influence on the album is unmistakable, lending Otaku Punk a more expansive and collaborative feel. The album also features guest appearances by Jake Aron of Moloq, Meredith Law of Palm Sunday, and Noah Kittinger of Bedroom.

Fake Flowers bio

Many bemoan millennials' constantly shifting attention spans, deriding the generation for its inability to focus and complete work. In reality though, this couldn't be further from the truth for Atlanta trio Fake Flowers. Despite the band's broad interests — expansive shoe gaze, jangly guitar pop, jolting post-punk, and splashy surf — their forthcoming Wonder Wave EP represents a fully-intended diverse array of pop songs.

Jacob Chisenhall and Jack Wucher began writing for the EP at the end of 2013, but its six songs weren’t fully realized until the band began following new muses, adding drummer Andy Barton in the spring and summer of 2014. The band recorded and produced the EP themselves, wanting full creative control to experiment with each track on their own time. They then sought out Nathaniel Kiser of Sleeping Partner Studios in Atlanta to mix and Jesse Mangum of The Glow Recording Studio in Athens to master.

Wonder Wave’s six songs symbolize distinct but cohesive universes, each evoking separate worlds of sound and emotion. Within each song, listeners might recognize the influence of a particular artist or genre of music before the next song completely changes the EP’s course, reflecting a style familiar to a period of time some twenty or more years later, still linked though by the instant familiarity and catchiness of pop music.

Aside from this general unity, themes of identity and the ongoing struggles associated with it appear throughout the EP. For all three members, the period of time at which they wrote and recorded Wonder Wave proved to be incredibly tumultuous, with romantic relationships changing and ending, jobs terminating, and living situations falling through. Still, the band carried on, intent on creating a fully realized body of work despite the personal hardships they faced.

Fake Flowers knows it’s necessary to shift its attention, as should all artists. Without doing so, one becomes stagnant and doomed to prolong the routines of old. With Wonder Wave, they hope to share a sliver of their world, with a promise of continued exploration into universes unknown.

Wonder Wave will be released March 24, 2015.