Nick Bassett, fresh off his foray into acoustic pop with Camera Shy, is returning to what we best know him for: the dark stuff. The dude’s made a name for himself as a member of Nothing and Death Of Lovers, and as a former member of Deafheaven. Whirr is his shoegaze project, and “Mumble” is the first single off of the group’s upcoming album, Sway.
I’ve already pontificated on the rampant unintelligibility of lyrics in shoegaze, and “Mumble” is the self-aware song that the genre’s been missing. The words are literally mumbled, but that lack is more than compensated for by the quintet’s use of guitars and drums. Guitars swirl to celestial heights as the drums pound them back to the ground, maintaining a push/pull balance of darkness that unsettles the traditional notion of shoegaze as a simple offshoot of alternative music. Bassett’s post-punk and Nor Cal metal influences are very much tangible on “Mumble”, a subsumption into a terranean landscape trapped in the dark.
Whirr is also setting out on a tour in support of the album. Check out the dates beneath the embed.
Sway will be released on September 23 via Graveface Records.
Whirr North American Tour:
August:
30 San Fransisco, CA at The Rickshaw Shop !
September:
01 San Diego, CA at Soda Bar !
02 Los Angeles, CA at The Echo !
03 Tempe, AZ at 51 West !
05 Dallas, TX at Sons of Herman
06 Austin, TX at Holy Mountain
07 Houston, TX at Mangos
09 Orlando, FL, at Backbooth
10 Savannah, GA at Graveface HQ #
11 Atlanta, GA at Masquerade Purgatory #
12 Chapel Hill, NC at Local 503 #
13 Richmond, VA at Strange Matter #
14 Baltimore, MD at Metro Gallery #
15 Philadelphia, PA at The Barbary #
16 New York, NY at The Studio @ Webster Hall #
17 Cambridge, MA at Middle East Upstairs #
18 Hamden, CT at The Space #
19 Montreal, QC at Sala Rosa #
20 Toronto, ON at Hard Luck #
21 Cleveland, OH at Mahalls #
22 Lansing, MI at Mac’s Bar #
23 Chicago, IL at Beat Kitchen #
24 St. Louis, MO at Fubar
26 Denver, CO at 7th Circle Collective
27 Salt Lake City, UT at The Shred Shed
28 Boise, ID at The Crux
29 Seattle, WA at Vera Project ^
30 Vancouver, BC at The Electric Owl ^
October:
01 Portland, WA at Slabtown ^
! – with Sad Actor
# – with Cloakroom
^ – with Special Explosion