One of our ones to watch for 2022, Chicago trio Horsegirl have announced their debut record, Versions of Modern Performance, out June 3rd on Matador, announce their first UK and European tour dates, and shared the single/video, ‘Anti-glory’. Watch below.
Following last year’s one-off ‘Billy’, lead single ‘Anti-glory’ bounds in on a wave of galloping drums and propelling bass and caustic riffing, the double-barrel vocals spinning like a carousel top somewhere between the addictiveness of Throwing Muses and the abrasive nonchalance of Kim Deal. The central call is a command rather than an offer: “Dance / Dance / Dance / Dance / With me”. The accompanying video, directed by Erin Vassilopoulous, puts Horsegirl front and centre.
“We wrote Anti-glory almost by accident while messing around with an old song during rehearsal. The song fell into place immediately, and looking back, we have no idea how we wrote it,” the band explains. “As always, this song and album are for Chicago, our friends, our friend’s bands, everyone who can play the guitar, and everyone who can’t play the guitar.”
Penelope Lowenstein (guitar, vocals), Nora Cheng (guitar, vocals), and Gigi Reece (drums) – the best friends comprising Horsegirl – do everything collectively, from songwriting to trading vocal duties and swapping instruments to sound and visual art design.
The friendship of these three goes far beyond Horsegirl. Reece and Cheng, college freshmen, and Lowenstein, a high school senior, learned to play—and met—through the significant network of Chicago youth arts programs, and they have their own mini-rock underground, complete with zine distros, that they describe as somewhat separate from the “adult shows” that take place at bars and DIY spaces they don’t have access to. They’re exultant about their friends’ talent, noting that any of the bands from that scene could have been (or might still be!) plucked up the way they were.
Versions of Modern Performance was recorded with John Agnello (Kurt Vile, The Breeders, Dinosaur Jr.) at Chicago’s Electrical Audio. “It’s our debut bare-bones album in a Chicago institution with a producer who we feel like really respected what we were trying to do,” the band says. Across the record, Horsegirl will play their first-ever UK and European shows in June, including a matinee and evening show at Paper Dress Vintage in London on June 19th and a show at Bermondsey Social Club in London on June 22, as well as dates in Manchester and Bristol. The tour kicks off with a special record release show at Thalia Hall in Chicago on Sunday, June 5th. Next week, Horsegirl head to SXSW before their debut performances in Philadelphia, Washington, DC and New York City. Full dates are listed below.
The album will be available in physical and digital track listings which can be found below. It is available to pre-order at https://horsegirl.ffm.to/vomp.
Digital Tracklist
1. Anti-glory
2. Beautiful Song
3. Live and Ski
4. Bog Bog 1
5. Dirtbag Transformation (Still Dirty)
6. The Fall of Horsegirl
7. Electrolocation 2
8. Option 8
9. World of Pots and Pans
10. The Guitar is Dead 3
11. Homage to Birdnoculars
12. Billy
Physical Tracklist
1. Electrolocation 1
2. Anti-glory
3. Beautiful Song
4. Live and Ski
5. Bog Bog 2
6. Dirtbag Transformation (Still Dirty)
7. The Fall of Horsegirl
8. Option 8
9. World of Pots and Pans
10. The Guitar is Dead 3
11. Homage to Birdnoculars
12. Billy
credit: Cheryl Dunn
