ARIEL VIEW @ SODA BAR On their Epitaph debut Until My Lungs Are
Cleared, ARIEL VIEW CHANNEL THE MOST COMPLEX AND MESSY EMOTIONS INTO
11 IMMACULATELY ARRANGED INDIE-rock songs. Tapping into the kinetic
energy they first revealed in playing backyard shows all around the
Inland Empire, the Ontario, California-based band blends punk and
surf-rock into a finespun sound that’s viscerally charged yet
gracefully melodic. And in their lyrics, ARIEL VIEW SHARE STORIES OF
DRINKING TOO MUCH AND MISSING THE WRONG PEOPLE AND DREAMING OF RUNNING
THOUSANDS OF MILES AWAY, with sisters Harmonie and Heaven delivering
each of their lines with both raw sensitivity and defiant
self-assurance. Recorded at Route 2 Recording Studios in L.A. and
produced by Joe Reinhart (Hop Along, Remo Drive), Until My Lungs Are
Cleared takes its title from a song that Harmonie wrote when she was
14-years-old. With its gauzy guitar tones and languid rhythms, the
track unfolds in a delicate reverie that hints at ARIEL VIEW’s
psych-rock-inspired sensibilities—a dream state that’s disrupted
by the palpable pain of Harmonie’s lyrics (e.g., “I'll forget you
one day so I could finally sing all these songs/That remind me of
you”). And while Harmonie describes “Until My Lungs Are Cleared”
as “a song about being a bad kid, and going out with friends and
partying and just wandering around,” Nadine notes its intense
emotional impact. “It’s this horribly sad breakup song about how
you can’t live without this person, and you’re just waiting until
the day when you’re okay enough to sing the song you used to sing
together,” she says. On “Friday Nights” veers into a much
grittier mood, taking on a breakneck momentum as Harmonie reflects on
the ending of a two-year relationship. “I watched that whole
relationship and saw how toxic it was—it made me so sad to see my
sister go through that,” says Heaven. “When I heard the lyrics to
‘Friday Nights,’ I knew what every line meant. It hits so hard
because it comes from a very real place.” One song later, on
“Summertime,” Until My Lungs Are Cleared offers up an anthem built
on bouncy beats, airy harmonies, and self-possessed lyrics (“Me and
my friends will make it every night”). But with Harmonie pointing
out that “most of these songs are breakup songs,” the album
assumes a feverish urgency on “Midnight”—a track that first
appeared as a stripped-back acoustic number on ARIEL VIEW’s 2015
self-titled debut, then emerged as a lo-fi demo on 2017’s Leo.
“‘Midnight’ is interesting to look at, because it’s gone
through so many stages,” says Nadine. “On the first version, Harm
is way younger and she’s got this little-kid voice, and now with the
new version you can really see the growth of the band, and what ARIEL
VIEW IS TODAY.” Founded in 2014, ARIEL VIEW BEGAN AS A TWO-piece
featuring Harmonie and a former member who left the duo soon after
they’d released their debut. “When that happened my dad told me I
should have Heaven join,” Harmonie recalls. “She was only
12-years-old at the time and I was like, ‘I don’t want this kid in
my band’—but then she started playing with US, and it was actually
really good.” (Both lifelong musicians, the Martinez sisters have
played in a number of cover bands with their father—including a
Smiths cover band and a Beatles cover band—with Miranda and Nadine
sometimes also joining those groups onstage.) As they began playing
more shows—and shaping a sonic identity largely inspired by alt-rock
bands like The Strokes and The Growlers—ARIEL VIEW CYCLED THROUGH
MANY GUITARISTS AND DRUMMERS, eventually bringing Nadine into the
fold. “One of their former drummers is a coworker of mine,” says
Nadine, who works at Sam Ash Music. “The band did a photo shoot and
I thought they looked cool, so I got on Instagram and DM-ed them like,
‘Hey, can I be in your band?’” Within a week of hearing back,
Nadine learned all of ARIEL VIEW’s songs and met with them for a jam
session, then immediately joined as their drummer. Not long after
that, they found their lead guitarist in Miranda, who played in a
local band called MoonFuzz. After admiring her guitar skills for
months on end, Heaven received an Instagram message from Miranda,
asking if she wanted to get together and play. After a few jam
sessions, Heaven asked Miranda to join the band. With their lineup
solidified at last, ARIEL VIEW LANDED THEIR DEAL WITH EPITAPH SOON
AFTER THE RELEASE OF LEO, and set to work on Until My Lungs Are
Cleared at the start of 2018. Over the years, ARIEL VIEW HAVE GONE
FROM PLAYING BACKYARD PARTIES TO TAKING THE STAGE AT FESTIVALS LIKE
TOP ACID FEST—where, at the 2018 festival, the band dealt with a
bomb scare during their set. “There were a lot of skinhead punks
that year, and somebody brought a fake grenade,” says Nadine. “The
SWAT team showed up and there were helicopters everywhere, and Harm
and I just looked at each other like, ‘Fuck it, let’s just play
through it—if we die, we die.’ But we didn’t die, and it was
great.” As a queer-identified band, ARIEL VIEW ARE PASSIONATE ABOUT
SUPPORTING AND EMPOWERING THE LGBTQ COMMUNITY, and creating an
inclusive space at all of their shows—a spirit of solidarity that
deeply informed the songwriting on Until My Lungs Are Cleared.
“We’ve had a lot of people come up to US and tell US how our songs
have helped them feel more comfortable with being themselves, which is
a really great feeling,” says Harmonie. “I know that I personally
go to music to feel like someone else understands what I’m feeling,
and that it definitely relieves my anxiety. So if our music can make
other people feel better and a little less alone, that would be the
best reward.” https://www.facebook.com/ArielViewBand/
[https://www.facebook.com/ArielViewBand/]
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14/12/2019 Last update