beth verse ~
it’s been a damn decade since Gayngs graced us with their last and only official music. Relayted, a rainy, 80’s prom soundtrack to make you swoon–which was gifted back in 2010.
now, the band members listed is an entirely transformed roster, but the musical spell remains, and it lingers. Appeayl 2 U abides by the same crystalline recipe: semi-cryptic lyrics delivered on repeat, their spare obscurity contrasted with a lushness of texture and mood. Relayted is at turns, opulent and sing-song. octave and have. sativa. whereas the new single, which was released exclusively via Bandcamp with proceeds benefiting Voices for Racial Justice, a Minneapolis organization offering comprehensive organizing and healing solutions, feels more urgent than ever, even simple, the whole thing is less than thirty words, contorted, repeated, and mantra-ized. but still, it’s synth & saxophone, and it’s more about the way it makes you feel.
i’ll be honest, Brian and i’s tastes diverge quite a bit, but might I say that what resides in the middle of our eclectic venn diagram is some truly dope music.
bmates verse~
I’ll never forget when Bobby Konosk showed me Gayngs over at Patrick Gutman’s house in 2010 and we all just kind of melted. My favorite thing about this track, aside from being just absolutely & immediately gorgeous, is that it maintains the early 2010’s indie feel while also being completely, ground-breakingly new. This track is an immaculate symphony of both insecurity and confidence perfectly arranged to enter our ears and seep into the grooves of our brains to tell whatever story we want it to. I couldn’t tell you why, but to me, this track brings me back to those first feelings of infatuation in middle school, and those feelings of inadequacy in high school, packaged together with a warming sense of calm that I could have used in both of the aforementioned times of my life.
It’s gorgeous and I want more! like beth said, our tastes differ quite a bit but we always seem to come together for the songs and things that mutually matter which is really how we’ve stayed friends for all of these years, and this is one of those songs. she can spot a meaningful ripple in culture happening anywhere in the world from her presumably bohemian living room consistently which is something I’ve always respected about her, and when she sent me this song and honored me with the opportunity to write with her I was flattered.
I’ll leave you with that we want the ACL show we never got! And maybe now we will finally get it (not now but like, in 2021 or whatever), and I’m sure it will be well worth the wait.
bridge~
yes please. we need more. dare i ask for another album? when i sent bmates this track, i was gonna be pissed if he didn’t dig it. this embodies many things that music should be right now: centering identity, in this case, midwestern, and centering POC artists. the subversion built in. fuck structure and new language, titles intentionally ‘misspelled.’ it seeps indeed.
like Brian said, the song feels permeable, personal. and i think it’s the abstraction that makes it interactive, a collaborative supplication of meaning to enact it. a swanky chant. i imagine Gayngs as an adjective, not a set group, but a fluid unit, a state of being.
beth reprise ~
i remember my first gaudy melt also. I think it was Brian Ducoffe who showed me the album. And I became obsessed, listening all the weekend I found out, and it was raining in socal I was wearing all black, piercing puddles with my heels.
Appeayl 2 U samples the same bespoke backbeat from The Gaudy Side of Town that sounds like it’s made by tongue & teeth. i just imagine that stem file floating around for all these years. saved and salvaged from some drive.
and this is coming out of a city that’s aching and simultaneously rising, uniting.
when i listen to this song i think thank you. and damn, y’all, we need to wail, and sway, and hold our unrest aloft.
look after our vigils. circle back to favorite tracks and their backbones from a decade ago. cyclical healing.
stay faded
xo
~ ~ ~
please purchase the track! pay/donate what you can https://gayngs.bandcamp.com/
with proceeds benefiting: https://voicesforracialjustice.org/
p.s. thanks for the kind words, Brian, my living room is pretty rad
