“25 years from now, when “dream pop” returns from a number of years of exile, it may very be records like Leaper that inspire the next generation of shoe-gazers.” – KCRW
“The band push through the shimmering washes of reverb with their guy/girl harmonies, setting off a swoon with Kevin Shields-influenced guitar effects.” KEXP SONG OF THE DAY
Toronto’s Beliefs (Josh Korody and Jesse Crowe) premiered their new video for album opener “1994” on Billboard, and revealed the details of their new record, Habitat, due out September 22nd on Outside Music/Hand Drawn Dracula. Habitat is the third full length record following their self-titled debut in 2013 and 2015’s Leaper. Beliefs also shared the Christopher Mills (Broken Social Scene, Modest Mouse) directed video for the first single ‘1994‘.
“[It’s] a love affair between human and concrete,” says Beliefs vocalist-guitarist Jesse Crowe, speaking about the Toronto-based indie band’s latest track. “‘1994’ explores the relations we have to the high rises around us, as living, breathing entities.”
Director,Christopher Mills says of the video, “BELIEFS write music that transports me to inter-dimensional worlds awash with waterfalls of sounds that stir up ghosts, memories, and really weird dreams. “1994” is the apex of a triptych of dream-state videos that feature magic battles, flying ghosts, and impressionistic German Cabaret inspired dance performances, dipped in Yves Klein blues, and broadcast to a broken TV set.”
“Jesse and Josh brought an intense performance of subtleties that needed very little augmentation,” continues Mills. “The edit dutifully followed Jesse’s lead as she inhabited the character of a caretaker of this strange ‘other place.’ I had to edit this one at a stand up work station because it was impossible not to dance while channeling the androgynous love child of Charlotte Rampling and Ian Curtis.”
Habitat was finished in an impressive 16 days, with Korody serving as producer and engineer, studio multi-tasker Leon Taheny (Austra, Death From Above 1979, Owen Pallett) sitting in as drummer and mixed by Holy Fuck’s Graham Walsh (Preoccupations, Alvvays and METZ).
“It’s a dark record, for sure,” affirms Crowe. “I feel like we were drawing a lot more from, like, me being a Goth teenager and Josh only wanting to listen to Aphex Twin and me only wanting to listen to Portishead’s Third for the last year and stuff like that. But also it was time to embody the elements of being a ‘wall-of-sound’ band with some space and the idea of being able to be quiet when you should be quiet, and you can’t do that with three guitars. There’s no space. It just becomes all push and no pull.”
