Stream: Swerve, ‘Escape’

Kevin Bronson on October 13th, 2020

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After releasing self-produced EPs in 2015 and 2018, L.A. quartet Swerve convened with producer Adam Lasus (Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Army Navy and more recently Nightjacket and the Pretty Flowers) at his new Studio Red for work on the band’s biggest project yet, their debut full-length.

Swerve’s music blends eras and styles of guitar rock — the urgency of vintage punk rock and ’90s indie mixed with chiming psych-rock and Britpop. Though, thankfully, not all at the same time. But the album’s first single combines seemingly disparate sounds: buzzsaw chords backgrounded by a twinkle of the psychedelic, colliding and exploding on the bridge.

Not to get too guitar-nerdy, but the quartet’s intentions were clear. “‘Escape,’ our first single off our debut album, is both a ripping and dreamy song about leaving all the chaos and frustrations of life behind and heading off on an adventure with someone you love,” says singer-guitarist Gregory Mahdesian, who founded the band with guitarist Ryan Berti and is now joined by bassist Brandon Duncan and drummer Mark Gardner.

“While recording, we jokingly dubbed it ‘Anarchy In The Fields Forever,’ because we used ‘Anarchy In The UK’ by the Sex Pistols and ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ by the Beatles as our primary sonic references for the guitars and found the contrasts in those tones to really go well together,” Mahdesian adds.

The video is the work of Maddie Liner, using both original and found footage. The album is due to arrive in early 2021.

||| Watch: The video for “Escape”