Superbloom

Rock hasn’t had its last gasp yet: Not with bands like Superbloom around.

Feverish and raw, and with an instantly memorable punch, Brooklyn’s latest rock phenomenon is a group of four guys making the songs that they want to hear. That means searing, overdriven guitars and thrashing drums; heavy, hearty riffs full of fire and flavor; and impassioned, driving vocal melodies that get stuck in your head for weeks on end.

It’s all about the music for Dave Hoon (vocals/guitars), Tim Choate (guitars), Brian DiMeglio (bass) and Matteo Dix (drums), who came together in 2018. This is much more than four friends jamming in a basement; having played in bands for their whole lives while pursuing full-time careers, they formed Superbloom out of a calling they couldn’t deny.

With no room for bluffs or half-hearted attempts, Superbloom introduced themselves with 2020’s “Level Head,” followed the next year by their 12-track debut album Pollen. The record, mixed by Joe Reinhart and Mastered by Will Yip, received critical praise from such influential outlets as Consequence, Visions, and Atwood Magazine, who called it “an explosion of energy that hits hard while cutting to the core of human experience.” To date, its tracks have garnered over 1.7 million global streams on Spotify alone, with “1994”, “Falling Up” and “Daisy” receiving additional radio airplay from BBC Radio 1, Triple J and others. Pollen represents Superbloom’s early era of self-discovery – an era that is already well in the rearview.

Superbloom’s new EP Life’s a Blur is music you can feel in your gut: A conscious progression from Pollen, its songs have a harder edge and an undeniable, ever-present weight. Superbloom reach greater depths of sound through dynamic, varied songs and interludes that range from ethereal to manic, all while retaining those signature hooks, dreamy tones, and infectious bouncy rhythms that made their debut so irresistible. Recorded by Brian DiMeglio at Brooklyn Recording Paradise and mixed/mastered by Zach Tuch, these new songs showcase an expansion into new sonic dimensions and dynamics as Superbloom find themselves in both roaring, heated high-octane songs like “Pig” and “Head First,” as well as the peeled-back, cinematic, and pop-leaning standout, “Tiny Bodyguard.”

A hard-hitting band with an unapologetic sound, Superbloom is a success story to never give up on your dreams, and they have a lot more in store as they step into a bold new era. “I’d be lying if I said we planned to throw away the playbook for the EP, but I’m glad we did, because everything cool and unfamiliar mushroomed from there — on and off stage,” Dave Hoon says. “Pollen is in the rearview and I’m hungry for what’s next.”

Life’s a Blur is out June 8.

Footballhead

Footballhead is a Chicago-based alternative rock band headed by Ryan Nolen. At its heart, the band is a vessel to toil forward through internal and external insecurity. It also serves the unrelenting spirit of new-millennium Midwestern youth, with MTV and skatepark dreams in the core of their memories. By blending pop structures with alt and emo sounds, Footballhead channels the frantic, dramatic, and anthemic to map the pressure points of existence. It’s outcast music, revitalized in search of a modern, blissful awakening.

Nolen was a skate kid from the western Chicago suburbs; the one who only kicked it with older neighborhood kids. The punkish attitude of late-90s and early-aughts alt-rock galvanized Nolen, from the infectiously fun music down to the fashion. A teenage relocation to Palm Springs, CA coincided with Nolen inundating himself with all the music he could: Warped Tour, 411 videos, Limewire and the like. The Footballhead ethos comes from this comfort zone of pop impulses and raucous energy, carried by a DIY spirit that grants Nolen the autonomy to facilitate honesty and reflection.

Joined by Adam Siska (The Academy Is), Liam Burns, and Robby Kuntz, Footballhead crafts supercharged rock songs like brief, open secrets. However weathered one is from their struggles and mistakes, this music offers unbridled fun as a reprieve, and salves for the shaken. These are your old friends inviting you in to commiserate, elevate, and believe.

2024 has seen the band release their debut album ‘Overthinking Everything’ and follow up EP ‘Before I Die’ to critical acclaim, with playlisting and radio play around the world. Recent tracks have appeared everywhere from famed Spotify playlists ‘Adrenaline’, ‘Emo Right Now’, ‘All New Rock’ and ‘The Scene’ among many others, to tastemaker radios stations such as Australia’s Triple J and Chicago’s Q101.

Bleary Eyed

Bleary Eyed was formed in 2015 by frontman Nathaniel Salfi (guitar & vocals), now joined by Margot Whipps (bass & vocals), Pax Martyn (guitar), & Charlie Libby Watt (drums). Since their inception in the DIY scenes of DC and Philadelphia respectively, the band has taken many artistic turns. Through that experimentation, they’ve had time to grow into the sound they were always meant to make, filling a unique space in the shoegaze genre with their sample-heavy hazey computer pop atmosphere. The band presents both a positive yet outside energy with relatable lyrics with stacked harmonies from Whipps and Salfi over densely layered sample filled instrumentals. The songs teeter from more pleasant pop songs to heavier fuzz tracks sometimes blending elements from both styles.

On their most recent self-titled EP, a collection of four songs that combines an ethereal shoegaze shine with some of their post-punk roots, Bleary Eyed the EP possesses a certain shimmer. “I could write shit that’s really esoteric” says Salfi. “But I want to write stuff that’s fun and warm for people to enjoy too.”

That aforementioned warmth has always been Bleary Eyed’s golden string, the thing that has led them through the labyrinth of life and back to the sense of community and undeniable love that defines their origin story. You listen to the EP, and you feel it too, whether it’s the way that Whipps and Salfi’s voices effortlessly complement each other’s or the sense of light that permeates the release.

It’s been there all along, through all the different versions of the band but this time they really got it. However, it was only by waiting that Bleary Eyed could have a self-titled so radiant, and that’s worth all the time in the world.”