CHVRCHES New Album
Screen Violence + The Cure's Robert Smith
Scottish electro-pop trio Chvrches, will be dropping their fourth studio album today. Screen Violence is sure to be as full of heart as anything they have put out there. For this record, they have tapped into what influences them both the positive and negative. In many ways it is an expression of what makes them them both as a creative cohort and as individuals.
Breaking News: The band is set to perform an intimate live show tonight, August 27 from the Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever Cemetery which will be livestreamed globally from 9pm PT on Amazon Music’s Twitch channel. Tune in https://www.twitch.tv/amazonmusic
The first single, He Said She Said, was featured in the premiere of American Horror Stories Rubber (wo)Man. Singer Lauren Mayberry takes a swing at controlling men with lyrics like, “He said “you need to be fed, but keep an eye on your waistline” and “look good but don’t be obsessed,” Keep thinking over, over I try””. She flexes that cred, she has honed for years, as a member of the collective feminist collective TYCI and biting back at internet trolls including Chris Brown. She and bandmate Iain and Martin said they were disappointed in Marshmello for working with him. For speaking out, they received death threats. Chvrches is not phased nor deterred.
As for the positive influences the second single, How Not to Drown, is a collaboration with none other than legend Robert Smith of The Cure. On June 2nd, Martin Doherty posted about the song’s beginnings. He has struggled with anxiety and depression his whole life and wanted to share something about how not giving up is worth it. He had been having a tough mental health day, so he sought solace in writing music, “on this particular day I made a demo called piano drum ting. now it’s called how not to drown and it’s a collaboration between my band and my all-time musical hero, Robert Smith”. Doherty told Zane Lowe of Apple Music that if it wasn’t for The Cure’s Disintegration and Pornography, he would not be doing music at all. The song is truly amazing and Smith definitely brings his signature goth-poppiness.
In December, Chvrches and John Carpenter, the renaissance man who scores his own horror films, will release a 7” in which they remix each other’s songs. They did Turning the Bones and he worked on Good Girls. They were blown away when he asked to remix the song because he has been such an influence. Mayberry told Spin that his “films and music have been so impactful on us over the years, and without the stories he created I am not sure that the concept of Screen Violence (and female narratives within the album) would exist in the way they do.”
Like their heroes Chvrches is not afraid to dance in and against the dark.
In case you missed it, Chvrches performed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on August 25 for a stunning rooftop performance of their single “Good Girls.” Watch below.
Chrvches on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon
