Out today, RVG reveal new track ‘Midnight Sun’ and video from their new album ‘Brain Worms’ set for release on 2nd June on Fire Records.
A hurtling rock song, ‘Midnight Sun’ deals in matters of disbelief, and what it feels like to live in a culture that often prefers to argue the semantics than save the world from burning. Aptly furious and defiant, Vager cuts through the chaos singing my city is in ashes / but I’m still burning bright / Hangin’ here like a lantern / in case you change your mind.
“I wrote this around the time of the Australian bushfires in 2019 when it felt like everything precious about this country was being destroyed by climate change. There were all these talking heads trying to play down how much of a disaster it was, instead focusing on how much they hate immigrants or queer people. I thought – the world is literally on fucking fire and this is what you choose to use your platform on? The song is contrasting these two things, and how sick we are ideologically that we can’t identify what real problems are” Romy Vager
Directed by Oscar O’Shea, the video was created on the stolen land of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation.
Named for the hyper-recognizable experience of each day bearing witness to a world of private obsessions being aired out in the infinite, ‘Brain Worms’ may not be wholly new territory for the Melbourne post-punk band and its lyricist/frontwoman Romy Vager, but this time around, there’s a newfound radical acceptance glistening overtop everything.
Bandmates Reuben Bloxham (guitar), Marc Nolte (drums), and Isabele Wallace (bass) are flawlessly adept in bringing Vager’s songwriting to life.
Recorded in London at Snap Studios with James Trevascus (Billy Nomates, Nick Cave & Warren Ellis, The Goon Sax), all ten ‘Brain Worms’ tracks surge with lush sounds and clear intentions — and the magic of an acoustic guitar once owned by Kate Bush, given to her by Tears for Fears (who, legend has it, wrote “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” on it).
After a momentous first five years — finding critical acclaim for their 2017 debut ‘A Quality of Mercy’, landing on countless end-of-year Best Of lists, and playing alongside some of the world’s biggest acts — RVG released their second album ‘Feral’ as the world was locking down in 2020. ‘Feral’ was hailed by Rolling Stone Australia as “the record of a lifetime” but between the four bandmates, ‘Brain Worms’ is the most confident they’ve ever felt in RVG. They’ve moved past their influences, pushed themselves, and tried new things. And they made a record they can, by all accounts, call their best.
RVG will be coming stateside to join Billy Nomates in April across the UK and then return to Europe for a run of dates in France, Netherlands and Germany.
‘Brain Worms’ is available in LTD Edition Blue Vinyl, Black Vinyl & CD. Out 2nd June.
