RYAN MEEKING ANNOUNCES NEW SINGLE & VIDEO ENDLESS RUN
Melbourne’s newest indie pop master Ryan Meeking has today shared his fresh cinematic single Endless Run. An evocative work, set within the joyous bloom of festival party culture, Endless Run is rich with euphoric abandon. Its visceral, multi-layered rhythm celebrates a summer to end all summers, its engaging lyrics highlighting the intense relationships that follow.
Meeking has released a stunningly bold video to accompany the track, inspired by human movement and directed by filmmaker and photographer Rick Clifford (Ainslie Wills, Bad Pony, Tori Forsyth). After having his music featured on massive television shows such as Suits, So You Think You Can Dance USA and Teen Wolf, Ryan Meeking (Whitaker, Gossling) is moving from one musical world to the next with this standout pop gem. And he’ll be celebrating the release with a launch show at Small Time (Brunswick) on August 12, tickets are available now.
Endless Run feels like just like its namesake – an infinite, beautiful journey into the unknown, characterised by an undeniable groove; Meeking’s cool, calm voice; clever melodies; and sharp, concise production. The track has influences of Jack Garrett, Gotye, and Benee, but feels particularly unique to Meeking and speaks to years spent intently, passionately studying pop writing. Co-produced and engineered by Sam Swain (Josh Cashman, Obscura Hail) and mastered by Randy Merrill (Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber), Endless Run is a heady, all-encompassing track. Meeking explains: “You’re in the festival crowd. Drink it in. Your friends, thousands of others, the music, the party, the complete loss of any sense of time and space – and who cares: the community in that. Everything is now, everything is amazing and its just the beginning. Welcome to your Endless Run.”
The video for Endless Run is a brilliant spectacle of light and movement, somehow both nostalgic and futuristic all at once. Meeking dances alone in this colourful world, and the result is hypnotic. Speaking on how the clip was developed – Meeking explains, “We knew we wanted to place the clip in a ‘nowhere’ space, an unnatural world created especially for the audience – like all my new music to come – so we took a risk on a rare new piece of lighting tech to get us there and it totally paid off. In fact, it really took on a character and life of its own. This is also the first time I’ve worked on music and really thought about how it sat in my body, so we went through a bunch of ideas on how to put human movement at the centre of the clip. In the end, nothing made more sense than what you see. A peppering of strange sci-fi vibes, some Rick Clifford magic, and we had a clip for Endless Run.”
Endless Run is another stellar addition to Ryan Meeking’s glowing and diverse discography, one which demonstrates his lifelong pursuit of music and art, and dedication to his craft, as he describes, “I talk a lot about music production because it’s something I’m incredibly drawn to, but nothing matters to me more than the song. So making music is always a balance between these two elements. My affinity with music started with my grandparents’ piano and took root in the theatre, watching family perform in musicals like Les Misérables. Something about that art form stuck with me – the bare, honest storytelling set to intricate, clever composition – music that doesn’t hold back. I don’t write for the theatre, but those qualities are something I’ve never escaped chasing in my own music. I guess I always think, ‘Why limit anything if the song can carry it?’ Making Endless Run was no exception.”
Endless Run is out July 14.
Tickets to the Small Time launch show on August 12 are available now.
THU 12 AUG | SMALL TIME, BRUNSWICK VIC | ALL AGES
Book a table smalltimegroup.com | 0497 617 857 | Artist donation at Eventbrite
LONTALIUS SHARES NEW SINGLE ‘SWIM’ AHEAD OF NEW ALBUM ‘ALL I HAVE’ – SET FOR RELEASE OCTOBER 4 + NATIONAL TOUR SUPPORTING JAPANESE WALLPAPER IN OCTOBER & NOVEMBER
Enigmatic NZ electronic artist Lontalius, also known as Eddie Johnston, has today announced his glowing new single Swim, a comforting, honest track about accepting the ups and downs of life, out now. Swim is also accompanied by a stunning clip, made in collaboration with Phoebe Gittins and Arty Papageorgiou (Pacific Heights, Whim, Weird Together). The prolific young artist has also announced his new album, All I Have, set for release on October 4. Lontalius will be joining Japanese Wallpaper on the road for his first ever Australian shows in October and November this year, kicking off at Melbourne’s Corner Hotel on October 25, then moving through Perth, Adelaide, Sydney and wrapping up in Brisbane at The Brightside on November 9.
Swim is an endearing track, seemingly buoyed by pessimism and optimism at the same time. Reminiscent of indie pop giants The 1975 and Troye Sivan, Swim is driven by a pounding beat and intricate guitar lines (not to mention a killer solo towards the end) while Lontalius’ idiosyncratic vocal floats above it all. Speaking on the inspiration behind the track, Lontalius says, “Swim is about the acceptance that with all the heartbreak, anxiety and stress of being young, the universe is still leading you on the right path. You can have everything seemingly perfectly lined up in front of you, but sometimes it just won’t work out… it’s a song that i’m really proud of. It hit a lot of marks I had been trying to hit for the past few years. It’s energetic and it has a pace to it that I haven’t done before, all the while still living in the ‘lontalius’ world, I think.”
The clip for Swim zooms in on the self-reflection in the song in a figurative and literal sense. Lontalius sings alone, in the gorgeous Wellington wilderness, looking deep into a mirror suspended in mid-air. The clip is beautiful, dreamy; an appropriate visual representation of Swim, as Lontalius explains, “The video follows me singing the song into a mirror, walking along various locations in my home Wellington, NZ. With the song mostly being a dialogue with my own brain – a moment of self reflection, it made sense for me to sing it back to myself. This clip was a culmination of a few ideas we’d had in our minds for a while. The picturesque NZ landscape never fails to contrast the emotion in my music…I made it with Phoebe Gittins and Arty Papageorgiou. They’ve done all of my videos as well as a number of other NZ artists. We tend to have similar ideas around what will work, I’m not sure if I could work with anyone else.”
If Lontalius’ debut LP I’ll Forget 17 was a snapshot of his life as a teenager, All I Have documents the period in life when he was exiting adolescence and entering adulthood. Outgrowing one era but not yet ready, perhaps, for another. With a characteristic melancholic, yet beautiful temperment, paired with wistful synthesisers and soft, gentle guitar, All I Have is a superb collection of songs from this impressive artist. Working in LA alongside Grammy award winning producer Om’Mas Keith (Frank Ocean, John Legend, Jay Z), Jim Fairchild (Grandaddy, Modest Mouse), Roy Blair (Kevin Abstract) and Mr Hudson (Kanye West), Lontalius dove deep into a varied array of infuences for this second album, drawing inspiration from the artists he grew up listening to, such as U2 (circa Joshua Tree), REM, and Coldplay, alongside modern pop auters Kacey Musgraves and Lorde. Reflecting on the album, Lontalius enthuses, “The main themes on All I Have are love, youth and anxiety. I started writing it at 18 so it basically follows my own experiences with love, being away from home, new pressures and pleasures, as well as that general feeling of ‘coming of age’. Just trying to make sense of it all… It was my intention to add a little more energy and life into my music than I had done before. I had built up energy and I wanted to let it out! It was also important to me that it didn’t end up being a bloated, 20 song thing. I wanted to be able to grab it all with one hand.”
Lontalius will be playing his first Australian shows ever in October and November this year supporting Japanese Wallpaper on his Glow national tour. Thrilled to be hitting the road for what is set to be a beautiful, immersive experience for audiences, Lontalius says, “I’m really happy I’m finally making it to Australia! I’m doing solo sets, playing new and older music from even my soundcloud days. Trying to create a sound that people can get lost in for 30 minutes or so.”
Swim is out now. All I Have is set for release on October 4.
LONTALIUS NATIONAL TOUR (SUPPORTING JAPANESE WALLPAPER)
FRI OCT 25 | CORNER HOTEL, MELBOURNE VIC| 18+
SAT OCT 26 | SEWING ROOM, PERTH WA | 18+
FRI NOV 1 | LION ARTS FACTORY, ADELAIDE SA | 18+
FRI NOV 8 | OXFORD ART FACTORY, SYDNEY NSW| 18+
SAT NOV 9 | THE BRIGHTSIDE, BRISBANE QLD | 18+
PARKER ANNOUNCES NEW SINGLE & VIDEO ‘CAN’T KEEP WAITING’ + ARTIST RESIDENCY & EXHIBITION ‘YOU, ME AND THAT OTHER THING’ AT SAWTOOTH ARI
Gifted visual artist, songwriter and musician PARKER has today announced her iridescent new single Can’t Keep Waiting, a once-in-a-lifetime song, one that soundtracks a grand leap into the unknown and away from everything comfortable and safe, set for release today, October 4. PARKER has also announced a cinematic video clip to accompany the track, made in collaboration with director and technology artist Jaymis Loveday (Emma Louise, Ball Park Music) and sculptor Briony Law. PARKER has just completed an artist residency at Sawtooth ARI gallery alongside drawer and sculptor Jo Lane, in order to prepare their upcoming exhibition You, Me and that Other Thing, an exploration into human connection. The official opening of You, Me and that Other Thing will take place today, Friday October 4 from 6PM at Sawtooth ARI in Tasmania (running for one month), and will include a screening of the Can’t Keep Waiting video clip.
Can’t Keep Waiting is transcendental, meditative; at times it feels almost ambient, with heavy, industrial percussion and repetitive synth patterns. But one thing that pulls the track into a truly close, emotive space is PARKER’s soft, intimate yet commanding voice. Evocative of Massive Attack and the lyrical and vocal prowess of Lana Del Rey, Can’t Keep Waiting is epic and overflows with the power of primal human emotion. “Can’t Keep Waiting is about gathering the courage to be honest with myself. It’s about letting go of all that is safe and familiar in life in order to evolve and grow,” explains Parker. “I believe it’s in the moments when we feel completely lost that we find the opportunity to discover something new about ourselves. Nothing is permanent, everything can change. Each moment we have the ability to create ourselves anew.”
Already receiving multiple accolades, including Best Concept at Clipped Music Video Festival in Sydney, Best Music Video at the Los Angeles Film Awards, New York Film Awards and Top Shorts, not to mention selection for screening at the Austria International Film Festival, the clip for Can’t Keep Waiting is a triumph of a true marriage between sound, visual art, and cinema. Made by PARKER, in collaboration with Jaymis Loveday and Briony Law, the clip sees clay mounds, turning gracefully to human forms, dissolving in a deep-seascape with very little light from above. PARKER displays a clear and intricate understanding of her art, as she describes the clip, “The clip concept for this song was born out of a video installation work I made called Dissolving Self. Dissolving Self was a projection installation of a video art work. The video was a of a clay cast of my face dissolving in water set on a loop that made it look like it was falling apart and then rebuilding. I showed the work to my friend Jaymis Loveday and he suggested we make an extension of the work by creating full body casts and miniature models using a larger tank and cinematography techniques in the filming. Brisbane based sculptor Briony Law worked closely with me on the sculpting of the plaster landscapes and made all of the body casts and moulds for us to create the figures.”
You, Me and that Other Thing is the title of the upcoming exhibition that will see PARKER and Jo Lane explore the many facets of human connection. The exhibition will consist of three parts: historic works where inspiration has already manifested, a transition piece, and the work from an experimental performance of unity. PARKER and Jo Lane have spent the last two weeks in residency at Sawtooth ARI, working side by side in a dedicated studio space where the exhibition will take place. Giving her audience a taste of what to expect from the exhibition, PARKER enthuses, “We will create a body of work together around the theme of human connection combining Jo’s skills in drawing and sculpting and mine in sound and video. The Exhibition will combine a collection of our existing works and the new work we make during the residency.”
PARKER is Tash Parker.
Can’t Keep Waiting is set for release today, October 4 and the You, Me and that Other Things exhibition will take place today at Sawtooth ARI at 6pm (October 4)
YOU, ME AND THAT OTHER THING EXHIBITION OPENING
FRI 4 OCT | SAWTOOTH ARI, LAUNCESTON TAS | 18+ | FREE ENTRY