FEELS today announced their new EP Subversive Reaction will be released on July 22nd, 2021, via Deemed Printable. The Los Angeles band has also shared “Night Walker,” the first single/video,from the EP, via a Brooklyn Vegan premiere; watch it now HERE. “We were all in the studio mixing Subversive Reaction when the lockdowns began. We gave ‘Night Walker’ a moody vibe that sounded to us like walking down big city alleyways alone at night, questioning the true meaning of ‘connection’… and then as the world was forced into isolation and the months dragged on, the lyrics hit in a much more literal sense than we ever could have imagined,” explains singer/guitarist Laena M.I. of the “moody slow-burn” (Brooklyn Vegan). “The video—directed by Jeff Fribourg with cinematography by Travis Waddell and starring dancer Gregory Barnett—paints a picture of quarantine: bouncing off the walls of our minds, facing who we really are in the absence of each other, but also a deeper longing to reunite with nature and our true humanity which was felt even before the pandemic.”
Subversive Reaction is FEELS’ first new music since their acclaimed 2019 sophomore LP Post Earth (Wichita Recordings)—heralded by outlets including Pitchfork, The Los Angeles Times, BUST, and FLOOD, among others—and is now available for preorder. Deemed Printable, an LA-based art publication, has produced a special pressing of the EP, limited to 250 silk-screened 12” vinyl, hand packaged and printed using a risograph printer in-house (see image below).
The Subversive Reaction EP was recorded by Mark Rains at Station House Studio in March 2020 and features new member Cole Berliner of Kamikaze Palm Tree on guitar and vocals (taking over for Shannon Lay after her 2019 departure), in addition to original members Laena M.I., Amy Allen (bass, vocals) and Michael Rudes (drums).
Hailing from the East side of Los Angeles, FEELS are known for their electrifying live shows and two highly regarded albums: their first, s/t, produced by Ty Segall and released in 2016 on Castle Face Records, and Post Earth, produced by Tim Green. Live, the band pulls no punches, delivering a potent blend of tight hooks, luscious melodies, and satisfying chaos. This energy serves as the perfect vehicle for their lyrics, which urge audiences to shake away apathy and be invigorated by a renewed sense of togetherness; after all, as Pitchfork noted in their 8/10 review of Post Earth, “…polemical discourse and rock’n’roll fun are not mutually exclusive—and, if anything, they should encourage one another.”
FEELS are currently working on their third full-length album, set for release on Wichita Recordings.
