In 1995, Sonic Youth, then 14 years into their profession, and on the cusp of a mainstream breakthrough, launched a brand new album, Washing Machine, that closed with an almost 20-minute track, “The Diamond Sea.” A lot of it’s a freeform jam of slowly unfurling guitar noise. Seemingly conscious of the unpalatableness of a double-digit working time largely given over to suggestions, the band launched a radio edit of “Diamond Sea,” a nice sufficient if comparatively neutered four-minute model that cuts out the squall. Its objective was served, to a restrict: The track did chart—although by no means greater than No. 23. Crucial success abounded, however the mass market by no means fairly caught on.
By the point the members of the Los Angeles band julie have been born (about midway between the discharge of “Diamond Sea” and Sonic Youth’s dissolution in 2011), the temporary promise of a mainstream second for troublesome rock music, within the wake of Nirvana’s success, was lengthy within the rearview. It was now the Obama years. Increase time for Coldplay followers, not a lot dissonance fans.
However enter Trump, and darkish clouds got here to go, as did middle-school commencement; in 2019, as excessive schoolers, guitarist/vocalist Keyan Pourzand, bassist/vocalist Alexandria Elizabeth, and drummer Dillon Lee, fashioned julie. The band’s first single, “flutter,” was launched in 2020, a yr during which gifted younger devotees of experimental rock music had loads of motive to shrink from the identified world and swath themselves in oceanic swaths of reverb.
julie emerged absolutely fashioned on “flutter,” a tightly wound grunge-pop rager with Pourzand and Elizabeth buying and selling vocals, each pleasingly apathetic. That track, like many of the remainder of their subsequent songs, was propelled by a completely ballistic drum efficiency by Lee. They have been influenced by Sonic Youth, clearly, however that they had little curiosity in that band’s atonal wandering. Julie’s energy was managed out of the gate.
Over the following three years, the group launched a handful of EPs and singles, experimenting with slight shifts in sound. One track may skew extra tortured emo, one other extra triumphant shoegaze. The brusque sheen of the Huge Muff pedal is ever current, however they by no means overindulge in fuzzed-out theatrics. They by no means noodle too lengthy. Just one track on the band’s debut album, my anti-aircraft buddy, clocks in at over 5 minutes—after which solely by three seconds. Plainly in a era (or two) for the reason that heyday of their most popular breed of experimental rock music, julie have mastered the duty of constructing songs that really feel sprawling and large, however which in actuality bloom and dissolve briefly order. You possibly can match lots of julie songs into one “Diamond Sea.” No radio edit wanted.
