Stream: Elle Belle, ‘Failed Dreamz’
Kevin Bronson on
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Songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Christopher Pappas launched his solo project Elle Belle in 2013 amid an existential crisis — he’d moved to L.A. a couple of years prior, leaving behind his Boston band Everyday Visuals, starting anew as Miracle Parade and releasing a gem of a power-pop album (“Hark and Other Lost Transmissions”). The first Elle Belle music that arrived in the summer of ’13 (which except for “You Better Mean It” has now vanished from the usual online locales) was likable, lo-fi psych-pop; Pappas is clearly upping the stakes on his upcoming release “Baptistina I & II,” which boasts 23 tracks. While nodding to the often gut-wrenching frustration of making music in today’s oversaturated climate, the first single “Failed Dreamz” is a Technicolor slab of driving synth-rock fuzzed out just enough so that it doesn’t sound like one of those ’80s bands with perfectly coiffed mullets. If Pappas has 22 more like this, his new album could be a wild ride.
||| Stream: “Failed Dreams”
||| Live: Elle Belle will be doing the Monday night residency in November at the Satellite.
||| Previously: Ears Wide Open
[…] 23-song album “Wako Gumbo” (he’s changed the title since unveiling the first song last fall) that one suspects might be true to its name. From the three songs Elle Belle has teased so far, […]