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• Retrospective Reviews , Reviews , Song Reviews

A Sweet Trip of Sweet Trip: A Guide Through the Cult Favorite Band’s Best Songs

• By: Joe Hoeffner
• June 2, 2021

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Engaging with the music of Sweet Trip is a very personal thing. That’s true for all music–the thesis of this very blog is that the listener forms their own story when listening to a song based on their own experiences–but it’s especially true with Sweet Trip. A Sweet Trip song is never just happy or sad: even their most upbeat moments have a wistful undercurrent, and even their most melancholy songs have a certain sense of wry serenity. This ambiguity extends to their albums:  Velocity : Design : Comfort  celebrates the possibilities of the future while hinting towards a deeper alienation, while  You Will Never Know Why  contains devastating ballads and peppy Stereolab-esque pop. Different people with different imaginations will hear the same music and come away with different conclusions.

As such, my ten favorite Sweet Trip songs will look very different from someone else’s. I don’t mean to position myself as an authority–Roby Burgos himself is reluctant to declare himself an authority on his own music, not wanting to override what fans might think–but since they released a new album and I had the immense privilege of interviewing Burgos , I want to share ten songs that I think are essential to understanding the unique beauty of this band. As ranking these songs would be like choosing a favorite puppy from a litter, they’ll be listed in chronological order.

“Fish” (from  Halica: Bliss Out v.11 ):  It’s not quite accurate to say that Sweet Trip arrived fully formed. Their debut album,  Halica , had elements of both ambient techno and shoegaze, but they didn’t always synthesize the two as neatly as they would in the future. Still, they had blissful soundscapes down pat, and the album’s opening track, “Fish,” still stands among their best. Clouds of synth and guitar drift across playful, clattering drums, while Valerie Cooper’s voice lilts and echoes like a mysterious spirit singing as she bathes in the depths of a cave. Even as it gets noisier towards the end, “Fish” still feels like a dream, a burst of optimism and possibility.

“Dsco” (from  Velocity : Design: Comfort ):  Considered by many Sweet Trip fans to be their best work (it’s ranked the highest on Rateyourmusic, the music nerd haven where I cut my teeth writing amateur reviews),  Velocity : Design : Comfort was where Sweet Trip truly came into their own. On  Halica , the electronic and rock elements were starting a tentative courtship; here, they’re happily married, and the result brims with imagination and joy. “Dsco” is  VDC  at its most optimistic, with vibrant pop hooks and crunchy rock candy guitars suggesting a glorious futuristic playground: it sounds like a utopian soda commercial in the best possible way. But while the lyrics invite us to “spread the towels and bring out the lotion” and “synchronize your time in motion,” the pleasure is tempered by the need to escape from something: “run away to the sun, to the comfort.”

“Velocity” (from  Velocity: Design: Comfort ):  Sweet Trip’s brilliance comes in part from their musical versatility. They’ve always delighted in genre fusion, but you get the sense that they could have been a pure dream pop band or a pure ambient techno outfit and been just as excellent either way. Case in point: “Velocity,” a straight-ahead IDM suite that stands tall alongside the Autechres and Venetian Snares of the world. While some IDM gets too caught up in its own cleverness, “Velocity” is endlessly evocative: its looping synth haze and sputtering drum crunches summons a world of blue holograms and jagged chrome skylines. Everything about it is pure cool, down to a distorted lounge-y piano put in the mix towards the end, but Cooper’s periodic vocals hint at a desperation and a loneliness behind all this opportunity.

“Chocolate Matter” (from  Velocity : Design: Comfort ): There’s something great about a band that knows exactly what its listeners want. Take “Chocolate Matter,” which comes towards the end of  VDC  and provides a dizzying rush of catharsis. It starts out as a catchy, lilting shoegaze song, not far off from You Made Me Realise -era My Bloody Valentine. Then, an absolutely thunderous guitar riff that sweeps in out of nowhere, sticking around just long enough to get you addicted before disappearing for a buzzing synth solo and another verse. “This is all great, of course,” you catch yourself thinking, “but I really hope that huge guitar riff comes back.” And then it does! And it repeats over and over again until the end of the song, growing louder and more ecstatic until it feels like your headphones might break! And it’s awesome!

“Acting” (from  You Will Never Know Why ): Musically,  You Will Never Know Why  is a lovely moonlit shimmer of an album, forgoing the noisier shoegaze and IDM parts of Sweet Trip’s sound for pure dream pop bliss. Lyrically, however, it gets dark, going into thorny, personal territory. “Acting,” an early highlight, gets a lot of mileage out of that juxtaposition. It’s a long, sprawling song, with a psychedelic outro left over from the  VDC  sessions, and the rich sounds make the lyrics dig their claws in deeper. “Don’t speak of golden dreams,” Burgos sings over a fast-paced, jazz-inflected section. “You once had a chance to make things right.” The “acting” described in the title refers to “acting on regrets,” but when Burgos coos “so sad, so sad, so hopeless,” the cruel joke of the title’s second meaning comes in. It’s the most luscious world’s-smallest-violin ever recorded.

“Milk” (from  You Will Never Know Why ): While “Acting” was acidic and bitter, “Milk” is just devastatingly sad. With its jangly acoustic guitar and yawning pedal steel, “Milk” sounds a little like Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You,” but while that song is an expression of romantic intimacy, “Milk” is about the loneliness of drifting apart. According to Burgos, “Milk” is about an insomniac watching their lover sleep, jealous of their peaceful rest. But in the song’s bittersweet tone, it’s clear that the divide is deeper and more complicated than that. “You will drift away/and I won’t mind,” Cooper sighs, and she means it. “Don’t you drift away,” she pleads afterwards, and she means that, too.

“Your World Is Eternally Complete” (from  You Will Never Know Why ): One of the album’s most upbeat offerings, “Eternally Complete” has plenty of darkness in its lyrics, but this time the darkness is being pierced by the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s a fast-paced pep talk of a song, with Cooper’s sweet, bell-like voice encouraging you to “carry yourself through the frozen desert” and “empty your thoughts into the well of pressure.” It’s a lot to ask, but it’s a testament to Sweet Trip’s empathy that it feels possible: it really does feel like they’re in your corner, and if they think you can carry yourself through the frozen desert, then, hey, why not give it a shot?

“Things to Ponder While Falling” (from  You Will Never Know Why Outtakes ): When “Things to Ponder While Falling” was posted to Soundcloud in 2015, the description said that it was “probably the last Sweet Trip song ever.” Thankfully, that turned out not to be the case, but if it really was the last we’d hear of them it would have been a wonderful coda. The first half of “Things to Ponder While Falling” is a gentle, almost halting lullaby, with Burgos and Cooper singing from the point of view of an outcast (or just an agoraphobe) hiding in their home from the “wounds of coyness and shame.” It’s not a happy song, but there’s a sense of peaceful resignation: if you’re falling, you may as well close your eyes and drift off before you hit the ground. Then, right when you think there’s nowhere else to go, a surge of guitar kicks in, and you get your second wind along with the band.

“Chapters” (from  A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals ):  When any band returns after twelve years, it’s natural to wonder what might have changed in their sound and what new approach they might take. In the case of Sweet Trip, they didn’t radically alter their sound for  A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals , but they did take everything they had done over their discography and put it all together into one lush, swooning package. Everyone who likes Sweet Trip will find something to like on this album, and “Chapters” may end up one of the best-liked songs of all: starting with a glitchy acoustic strum that recalls the warped warmth of Fennesz’ Endless Summer , it becomes a psychedelic swirl of guitar, synth, and voice, achingly tender and romantic. “Hand in hand, electrified/I will love you,” Burgos and Cooper promise, and the sentiment is earned.

“Snow Purple Treasures” (from A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals ): There’s nothing tiny about  A Tiny House . Although it’s not the longest album Sweet Trip’s ever made ( VDC  beats it by about four minutes), it’s definitely the most ambitious, aiming for transcendent romantic bliss at every turn. In the wrong hands, it could be exhausting, but with songs like “Snow Purple Treasures,” who could complain? Not unlike “Chapters,” it opens with a sparse acoustic strum and delicate vocals before expanding into the stratosphere, but there’s always something twilit and elegant to its sound. In short, it sounds like its title (the best Cocteau Twins song title Cocteau Twins never came up with.)

“Polar Equals” (from A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals ): If you wanted to narrow Sweet Trip’s entire discography down to one song, it might be “Polar Equals.” Sure, it lacks the gorgeous vocals that are essential to the band’s excellence, but it contains just about everything else: dreamy peals of guitar, brilliant blossoms of psychedelia, even a return to the blippy IDM of VDC. And to finish it all off, there’s a beautiful outro that shimmers and glimmers and darkens like black butterfly wings. It’s a perfect reminder of what Sweet Trip is capable of, and it’s when it finally sunk in that one of my favorite bands was back.

Joe Hoeffner

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Record hospital, an interview with sweet trip: origins and the return.

// Image courtesy of R__ob Uytingco.

Sweet Trip, currently consisting of Roberto Burgos and Valerie Cooper, is a dream-pop/shoegaze/electronica group formed in 1997, San Francisco. They are most notably known for their glitchy electronica album, Velocity:Design:Comfort , and their dream-pop album You Will Never Know Why . With these projects and few earlier works under their belt, Sweet Trip gained an early cult following that has been growing exponentially, even with their latest full release dating back to 2009 ( You Will Never Know Why ).

In 2021, Sweet Trip is making a long-awaited return after a 12-year hiatus with new singles and an album, A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals . The new music, along with reissues of previous albums, are available for purchase over at Darla Records !

Along with the great pleasure of allowing WHRB to chat with them, Sweet Trip provided a bountiful amount of information regarding the evolution that the group has undergone since its creation in 1995. More specifically, this interview also focuses on the recent end of Sweet Trip's 12-year hiatus and how it has affected the duo. Watch the interview in its entirety with time-stamped questions below, and read on to learn more about Sweet Trip’s story.

Like many musical artists, Sweet Trip was eagerly looking forward to live performances in 2020, especially after their return performance in January of that year. Luckily, the shift in lifestyle presented by the COVID-19 pandemic has not been a negative one for Sweet Trip in regards to writing, recording, and production. In fact, as Roby explains, “It feels more comfortable, it’s also more intimate and it caters very well to our personalities. We’re both introverts, we’re very self-conscious of what we do and what we don't do, it’s nice to be able to just record music and make music together by just ourselves because there are no prying eyes, there’s no judgment.” With so many barriers cut down, allowing for increased personal collaborative work, the new record appears to be very reflective of this insight and the duo as a whole. After all, it’s Roby’s favorite work of theirs yet!

In Sweet Trip’s earlier days, the lineup consisted of Roby, Valerie, and Viet Le. It was Valerie who played a leading role in music discovery. Roby said, “Valerie was always very instrumental in showing me and Viet newer bands that we were not exposed to. Valerie’s record collection, music, and knowledge of all this cool underground stuff was a huge influence on us.” As for Viet, Roby describes his role in the band as a “spiritual leader” who guided the group’s path and was vocal in expressing what worked and what did not work for them. Naturally, Viet was the businessman in the trio, “He’d whip us into shape as far as being more professional when we play, he was our main contact with bookings and networking,” Valy explained. So it seems that while Roby and Valerie were being self-proclaimed introverts, Viet was the “confident and articulate” extrovert that upscaled the band’s presence, eventually landing them a record deal.

For Valerie, it was her parents who introduced her to various genres of music, including bossa nova. When she started playing classical guitar, she seemed to have taken influence from her parents. However, the shoegaze genre later became a larger influence of her own that eventually brought her to buy an electric guitar. And of course, what’s shoegaze without guitar pedals? This marked the beginning of Valerie’s pedal collection as well as her love for shoegaze. Interestingly enough, it was not My Bloody Valentine, one of the most popular shoegaze bands, that influenced her to explore the sound. Instead, it was a much more underground act titled MOOSE and elements of post-punk music that rubbed off on her. For Roby, shoegaze influences were introduced to him in high school. He explained, “, There was this other classmate that had a class right before me in the same room and also at the same desk. She sat in it during the period before mine. She was also someone that I was curious about because she looked really goth and cool. I found out that she was carving the name of all these bands on the desk, so she had like Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, and a bunch of other stuff. From those bands, I knew who My Bloody Valentine was, so I immediately thought - ‘okay all of these other bands must be like My Bloody Valentine’.” Through this interesting encounter driven by curiosity, Roby discovered Slowdive and eventually bought a CD at Tower Records after school.

Beyond shoegaze, Sweet Trip’s sound is also based around the duos’ catholic background. Roby elaborates, “We were both raised catholic so we have a really strong catholic background so we know like mass hymns and things like that. The construct of a mass hymn sort of bleeds into some of the music that we do. I was actually remembering a conversation that we were having a couple of days ago because I was watching a documentary on youtube about Alice in Chains. While I was watching it I was always remembering an article about Alice in Chains and how the way that the two singers worked their melodies was really based on hymns and pentatonic scales and sort of like a modulation of harmonies. I remember being a kid and reading that interview and being like ‘Oh wow, that’s really cool!’ I do know catholic hymns, I kind of feel like I know how they work. So that has been an influence in the music in one way or another.”

In some respects, A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals , appears to be a culmination of all previous works, but, “it also has its own voice,” as Roby notes. With the new record out now, fans of Sweet Trip can find further comfort in knowing that both Roby and Valerie hope to continue making music together. Moreover, they hope to remain a duo act in most recording aspects due to their intimateness and bond. As for live shows, the pair is very welcoming of the possible company of other musicians. In the meantime, you can visit Sweet Trip’s Linktree for more listening and/or purchasing content.

// Gilberto Sepulveda Rabago ‘24 is a staff writer for Record Hospital.

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INTERVIEW: Sweet Trip

[VERSÃO EM PORTUGUÊS MAIS ABAIXO!]

Sweet Trip remained a pretty underground band for almost a decade, despite their mix of shoegaze, dream pop, IDM and glitch being rather unique. Fortunately, the band was (re)discovered before any tragic events and such buzz even inspired members Roby and Valerie to return their activities. A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals was released last May and it’s their first album in 12 years – get the physical versions here . I spoke with Roby about their new great record and more below.

First of all, how are you doing?

I’m trying to be ok. Hope you are well.

How does it feel to finally have a new album out?

It’s a mixed bag of emotions. It’s exciting to finally let a project loose and to see things unfold, and that also comes with a healthy amount of anxiety. This is new territory for us. Previous records were released without much talk. This time around there are expectations that we are fully aware of, and while they did not interfere with the writing of the record, once the record is out we acknowledge that those expectations are going to play a significant role in how people perceive it. That’s nerve-wracking, to be honest. At the end of the day, we both are super proud of A Tiny House . We set out to make a record for ourselves first and foremost, a collection of songs that come from the heart and speak to our souls. 

On that aspect, one could argue that Sweet Trip was not only re-discovered with time, but reappraised too. How do you feel about that? Did you guys see the buzz growing through the years or it was more of a sudden thing?

It is incredible that after all these years, people from around the world have started to pay attention to what we do. It is really amazing and humbling. I think we started to notice the buzz about a year or so before we started working together again, maybe a little earlier than that. We started getting messages from people through the weirdest places, like LinkedIn for example, and on a few occasions, people would ask us if we have seen the comments and rating on Rate Your Music. It feels sudden to us, even if “sudden” is actually a period of 3 to 4 years.

I was discussing with a friend that your earlier records are “super Bandcamp stuff”, meaning that aesthetic (experimenting with genres, gentle with glitchy, homemade yet expansive) is now common there. But we could also say that “mainstream” is more open to left-field stuff now, with PC Music and 100 gecs being examples. Do you feel that had something to do with Sweet Trip’s growing reputation?

Yes, I think so. I think that between VDC and now, people have embraced technology exponentially, and that has allowed people to not only be exposed to new ways of making music, but also to be more open minded. I think that has allowed people to appreciate our music a lot more than 20 years ago. It is similar in a way to how your palette becomes more sophisticated after you leave your childhood home as an adult, and explore new and exciting culinary experiences. 

Still on technology, it’s evident that “bedroom” production democratized dream pop and shoegaze, which were obviously gear based and expensive initially. On one hand, though, it seems those genres kind of lost creative ambitions a bit – to the point sometimes things are taken for granted, like reverb is automatically and always ethereal and if it’s noisy, it’s shoegaze. That’s not the case of Sweet Trip, as the new record shows. What’s your opinion about it?

That’s an interesting question, and my views on the subject may be a bit controversial, I don’t know – I hope not. I understand that desire to seek the “shoegaze aesthetics” because when we started in the mid 90s, we were seeking the sound too. We idolized our favorite bands to the point where we wanted to emulate them as much as we could, and our early recordings are basically imitating and even down right copying what bands like the Pale Saints, MBV, Moose, etc, were doing. I think that at some point we realized that shoegaze was about thinking outside the box, about representing sounds and emotions in unconventional ways. We realized quickly that shoegaze opened up a lot of musical and sonic possibilities beyond the wash of reverb and overdriven guitars, that it didn’t have to fit the guitar-bass-drums mold, and that there was potential to go beyond that mold. I think our love for electronic music also helped us in this regard. We’ve always seen underground electronic music as being very diverse and inclusive, and while many artists do seem to stick to one or a few particular sounds or styles, a lot of them also mix things that break out of those styles. 

I think that, without overanalyzing things, our approach to music is similar to what 80s and 90s hip hop was about, a collage of sounds, styles, and techniques, with disregard to what is considered acceptable or not. There was an element of mischief in 90s hip hop production, a sort of “let’s see what I can get away with” mentality that is still very important to us. 

I think that shoegaze today is still very much in that traditional 90s mold, and while there are some great bands out there, I am still surprised that not that many people (as far as I know) have taken that sound beyond sounding like MBV or Cocteau Twins, especially with all the production tools so freely available to musicians to help them spark creativity and to think outside the box. At the same time, I understand nostalgia and the desire for many artists to make music that is very pure and dear to their hearts. I just wish more people would ask themselves, “what if?” more often, because that question is a basis for adventure, not just in music but in every part of life. For example, “what if I spent a month in another country?”, “what if I make a pizza sauce with red bell peppers and tomatoes, instead of just plain tomatoes?”, “what if instead of heavily reverberated guitar, we use a chaotic sounding synth?”…

What was your gear / softwares for the album? How was the creative process between you and Valerie – any notable differences (outside of the pandemic scenario, of course)?

The new album was recorded using Ableton Live, with Wavelab audio editor for additional support and tweaks. Wavelab is something we have used since VDC not just for editing audio, but also as a creative tool to tweak and often transform or destroy audio. We used an array of plugin effects and instruments, some of them quite old from the very beginnings of VST plugins. I think that aside from the obvious guitars, electric bass, and some other percussive instruments and found sounds, the only hardware gear used on this record were a Boss phaser pedal, a Boss analog flanger, and a Korg Monologue for some specific sounds that could be achieved using plugins, but just sound better coming from a real analog synth.

For this record, the only notable difference in our creative process was the strong bond between Valerie and I, a bond that just became more, more solid and endearing in the last 2 years. It is still a surreal experience for us. We’ve always been well connected emotionally and musically in the past, and when we got back together after 12 years, it felt like picking up where we left off. Along with that there was a new emotional layer between us that really drove us to make this record happen. I’ve always felt that our records are, in a way, self indulgent (which is probably a shoegaze trademark), because we make music for ourselves first and foremost.

Valerie is always the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth person I aim to impress with the music we create, and if she is not impressed, then a song is shelved. With this new record, I think that self indulgence comes through even more because this record is not just about music we want to listen to and be happy with, but it is a record for us, full of passion. Aside from that, the creative process was about the same as in the past, in that there really isn’t a concrete creative process to speak of. A song can come from a feeling, a song title, a line for a lyric, a simple guitar chord progression, a beat, a sound, a moment, or an exercise.

This is the first LP with your faces presente somewhere, and it’s right on the cover! Why? What was the inspiration behind it?

In the past, we have always been a bit uninvolved in the artwork for our records. In several situations we couldn’t make up our minds about what to do, or we had to accept artwork that was not 100% there for our taste. This time around we decided that we wanted to have total control of any art that would represent us. At the same time, as we increased our social media presence, we organically started to cultivate this lo-fi, very DIY and homemade “brand”, I guess, for lack of a better word. That has given us more confidence in owning the space that we live in, and to feel about the decisions we make in that aspect.

When it came time to think about artwork for the new record, we went through a few ideas, but one that we kept going back to was to mimic the record covers of 60s and 70s that featured the peacock wicker chair. In fact, this idea came from a mini documentary on the wicker chair in music, that was created by Vox Media . We realized that in order to pull that idea off, we would have to part of the artwork itself, something that we definitely struggled with because, aside from our pictures on Instagram, we are not the type of people that seek professional, rock star portraits – we really dislike them. At the same time, we had a vision of creating an album cover that was rich, romantic, cheesy and kitschy, because the record is very rich in our opinion, and the entire thing is one big love letter, and the record is about us and for us first and foremost. Anyway, we get a kick at the possibility that if someone ever makes another documentary about the wicker chair in music, that A Tiny House may be mentioned in it, haha.

On the social media presence, I noted you even interact with “haters” online.

Overall, I like to interact with our fans whenever possible. It’s a very strange thing though because we are both very introverted and reserved. At the same time we are music fans just like the people that follow us and listen to our music. We know what it is like to wish you could send a message, an email, a letter, to your favorite band and hope to get a response from them. We know the value and the effect a response can have to us music fans. Valerie and I have talked about this multiple times. At the same time, we are just regular people, and we don’t mind getting into discussions with our fans whenever we can because we appreciate the love and support they have given us throughout the years. It’s the least we can do. 

We also try to engage with naysayers as you said for a few reasons. One, I must admit, is to interact with them in a human way, as kindly as possible, to let them know that we appreciate their feedback as long as it is constructive, and hopefully win some points from them to give us another chance, haha. Secondly, I am not a fan of negative internet discourse at all, and I firmly believe that when it comes to voicing opinions, engaging in discussion or arguments, we can do a whole lot better. So when I see tweets or posts that are not just negative, but down right abrasive, violent, rude, and therefore completely uninformative, the urge to reply comes out quickly.

This is not something I do regularly, nor in the past because I never felt like I had a platform to voice my opinions on that matter, but within the context of our band, comments are a little bit more close to home to sort of make me want to address them. Obviously, the last thing I want is to get into a shouting match with anyone, so I try to keep my responses light, objective, without pointing fingers. Something that I wish more people had in their communication toolset is that a comment like, “So and so band fucking sucks and they should die,” is not only rude, violent, insulting, and uninformative, but they are also disrespectful to our own opinions. If we care about what we believe in, then we owe it to ourselves to represent what we believe in with the same respect that we want others to grant us. Like, if you made a cake you are really proud of, and you are going to serve it to people, you can bring the cake to the table, explain what the cake is, and show how much and dedication to put into baking it – or, you can just toss on the table and say, “here, enjoy, I don’t care.” 

And well, people are pretty passionate about Sweet Trip – I mean, Velocity and You Will Never Know Why  are albums of the year in RateYourMusic , both have more ratings than any Bob Marley or Madonna records too. I saw one person wishing the band was “famous like Tame Impala” there…

We are really grateful and humbled by the RYM community and by all the nice things they have said about our music there. In many ways, the love people have given us there had an effect on us getting back together. I don’t know about being famous like Tame Impala though, haha. We definitely do not have any goals like that, but people’s well-wishes are super sweet.

You don’t consider doing shows when the world allows it again?

We would love to once it’s safe.

What are some bands you’d like to play with? Are there any new ones you consider as kindred spirits? I’ve heard you stan LOONA!

We would love to play with some of our idols, Slowdive, MBV, etc. I think that would be fantastic and quite an experience for us. 

We actually don’t listen to LOONA, nor k-pop in general. I think you are referring to that little remix snippet that was posted on Twitter. That was just made for laughs . I believe some people were saying that we were going to produce the next LOONA record, which I thought was funny, and that little remix was created to show what it could be like. It was just for fun. 

I find it pretty amusing that the new LP continues the idea of using the album title as a statement of sorts: there was the “slogan” thing on Velocity : Design : Comfort , the mystery of You Will Never Know Why and now the combination of songs, which I assume are a nod to the bonds between you two. Was that a planned thing?

That’s a good observation, one that I never thought of. Yes, I think there is something we are telling people about the album titles. I think that for us, everything that envelops a set of songs into a record has a story to tell, or for people to come up with. For the new record we wanted a title that represented the songs in some way or another, and that was what felt right in the end. It does convey that deep connection we have.

For us, a title of a record or a song is just as important as the song itself, not just an identifier, or a simple summary of what the song is about if you will – or like the summary to a chorus, as it seems to be the norm. A title for us can either reinforce the emotions of a song, or make the meaning of a song more vague, which is something we like to do. Anyway, A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals stands for emotional connections between people in a safe, humble environment.

O Sweet Trip permaneceu como nome cult por quase uma década, embora a mistura de dream pop, shoegaze, glitch e IDM do grupo tenha adiantado muita coisa dos anos 10. Felizmente, a redescoberta e avaliação vieram antes de algum acontecimento trágico, e a nova apreciação em fóruns online inclusive inspiraram Valerie e Roby a retomarem as atividades. A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals foi lançado em maio e é o primeiro (ótimo) disco do Sweet Trip em doze anos. Conversei com Roby sobre tudo isso e mais.

Qual o sentimento de enfim ter um disco novo na praça?

É um misto de emoções. Empolgante finalmente lançar um projeto e ver como as coisas se desdobram, e com isso vem uma dose saudável de ansiedade. É algo novo pra nós, já que os álbuns anteriores foram lançados sem muito hype . Desta vez haviam expectativas das quais estávamos plenamente cientes e, mesmo que não tenham interferido na composição do disco, uma vez lançado sabemos que essas expectativas vão ditar muito sobre como as pessoas o compreendem. É estressante, pra ser honesto. Mas, ao fim do dia, nós dois estamos super orgulhosos do A Tiny House . Nosso objetivo era fazer um disco primeiro e principalmente para nós mesmos, uma coleção de canções que vinham do coração e falavam com nossas almas.

Nesse sentido, pode-se dizer que o Sweet Trip não só foi redescoberto com o tempo, mas reavaliado também. Vocês viram isso crescer com os anos ou foi algo mais repentino? Como se sentem sobre? 

É incrível que, após todos esses anos, pessoas do mundo todo começaram a prestar atenção ao que fazemos. Acho que começamos a perceber o burburinho mais ou menos um ano antes de voltarmos a trabalhar juntos, talvez um pouco antes. Recebemos mensagens nos lugares mais inusitados, como no LinkedIn, e em algumas ocasiões perguntavam se vimos os comentários e as médias dos discos no RateYourMusic. Então parece súbito para nós, mesmo que “repentino” seja um período de 3 ou  anos atrás.

Estava discutindo com um amigo que os discos anteriores eram “Bandcamp antes do Bandcamp”, no aspecto de que tal estética (experimentar com gêneros, amistoso mas fragmentado, caseiro mas expansivo) hoje é mais comum por lá. Mas também podemos argumentar que o mainstream também está mais aberto a experimentos no pop. Acredita que influenciou na reputação do Sweet Trip? Sim. Creio que entre o Velocity : Design : Comfort e agora, o povo abraçou a tecnologia exponencialmente e isso não só permitiu a exposição de novos métodos de fazer música, como abriu mentes. É similar ao jeito em que sua paleta se torna mais sofisticada após sair de casa, se tornar adulto e explorar novas e empolgantes experiências culinárias.

Sobre tecnologia, é evidente que a produção caseira democratizou o dream pop e o shoegaze, que eram inicialmente caros e dependentes de muito equipamento. Na antemão, porém, parece que esses estilos perderam um pouco as ambições criativas de outrora – ao ponto de hoje ter quase virado convenção de que se é barulhento é automaticamente shoegaze, e se tem reverb já é etéreo. Qual sua opinião sobre?

É uma questão interessante, e minha visão pode ser um pouco polêmica, não sei – espero que não. Entendo o desejo de buscar “a estética shoegaze”, porque o fizemos quando começamos a banda nos anos 90. Idolatrávamos nossas bandas favoritas ao ponto de querer emulá-las o máximo que podíamos, e as primeiras gravações do Sweet Trip eram basicamente imitações (ao ponto de cópia) do que gente como Pale Saints, My Bloody Valentine, Moose, etc estavam fazendo. Penso que em certo ponto percebemos que shoegaze era sobre pensar fora da caixa, representar sons e emoções de maneiras não convencionais. E isso abriu muitas possibilidades sônicas e musicais para além das guitarras distorcidas e cheias de reverb, que não precisavam se encaixar no modelo “guitarra + baixo + bateria”. Acredito que nosso amor por música eletrônica também nos ajudou. Sempre enxergamos a música eletrônica underground como inclusiva e diversa, e enquanto vários artistas se prendem a alguns estilos em particular, vários outros os misturam.

Sem querer sobrepensar as coisas, creio que nossa abordagem musical é parecida com o a do hip hop das décadas de 80 e 90, uma colagem de sons, estilos e técnicas, sem compromisso com o que era considerado correto ou não. Havia certo elemento de travessura na produção noventista no hip hop, uma mentalidade do tipo  “vamos ver se consigo me safar com isso” que ainda é muito importante para nós.

Vejo que hoje o shoegaze é bastante calcado na tradição dos anos 90, e embora existam ótimas bandas, me surpreende que não muitas (ao menos que eu saiba) levaram o som para além de soar como My Bloody Valentine ou Cocteau Twins, ainda mais com todas as ferramentas de produção disponíveis tão facilmente para ajudar músicos a estimular criatividade e pensar diferente. Ao mesmo tempo, entendo a nostalgia e a vontade de muitos em fazer música que é pura e querida aos seus corações. Só gostaria que mais pessoas se perguntassem “e se…?” com mais frequência, porque essa pergunta é a base para se aventurar não só na música, mas em cada parte da vida. Por exemplo: “e se eu passar um mês em outro país?”, “ e se fizer molho de pizza com pimentões vermelhos, ao invés de só usar tomates?”, “e se ao invés de guitarra reverberada, nós usarmos um sintetizador caótico?”…

Qual foi seu set de equipamentos e softwares para o A Tiny House? Alguma diferença notável no processo criativo entre você e a Valerie, tirando o cenário da pandemia? 

O novo álbum foi gravado com o Ableton Live e o editor de áudio do Wavelab para ajustes e suporte adicional. Usamos o Wavelab desde o Velocity não apenas para edição , mas como ferramenta criativa para transformar ou destruir áudio. Experimentamos uma variedade de plugins de efeito e instrumentos, alguns da época bem inicial dos plugins VST (virtual studio technology). Creio que, fora as óbvias guitarras, baixo elétrico, alguns instrumentos percussivos e sons de objetos, o hardware usado no disco se resume a um pedal phaser e um flanger analógico da Boss e um Korg Monologue, para alguns sons específicos que podiam ser extraídos de plugins, mas soaram melhor saindo de um sintetizador analógico real.

A única diferença notável no nosso processo foi o forte laço entre a Valerie e eu, que só se fortaleceu nos últimos 2 anos. Ainda é uma experiência surreal para nós. Nós sempre tivemos uma grande conexão musical e emocional no passado, e quando nos reunimos após doze anos pareceu que estávamos continuando de onde paramos. Junto a isso houve uma nova camada emocional que nos guiou a fazer o álbum acontecer. Sempre sentimos que nossos trabalhos são, de um jeito, autoindulgentes (o que é provavelmente marca registrada do shoegaze) – já que fazemos música para nós mesmos em primeiro lugar.

A Valeria é sempre a primeira, segunda, terceira, quarta e quinta pessoa que busco impressionar com a música que criamos, e se ela não se impressiona, então a ideia é descartada. Com A Tiny House , acho que essa indulgência se sobressai ainda mais, porque não é apenas um disco sobre a música que queremos ouvir e ser felizes junto, mas um disco para nós, cheio de paixão. Fora isso, o processo criativo foi o mesmo de sempre, no ponto em que não há exatamente um processo concreto. Uma canção pode surgir de um sentimento, um título, um verso para letras, uma progressão de acordes simples na guitarra, uma batida, um som, um momento, um exercício.

Esse é o primeiro LP com os rostos de vocês presentes, e logo na capa! Por que? Qual foi a inspiração?

No passado, não nos envolvíamos muito com essa parte. Em várias ocasiões não conseguimos nos decidir ou tivemos de aceitar artes que não estavam sincronizadas 100% com nosso gosto. Dessa vez, decidimos que queríamos controle total de qualquer arte que fosse nos representar. Ao mesmo tempo, aumentamos nossa presença nas redes sociais e organicamente começamos a cultivar essa “marca” (por falta de uma palavra melhor) lo-fi, bem faça você mesmo e doméstica, e isso nos deu mais confiança.

Quando chegou a hora de pensar na capa, cogitamos algumas ideias e uma a qual retornávamos era imitar capas dos anos 60 e 70 que tinham a cadeira pavão. Na real, essa inspiração veio de um mini documentário sobre a cadeira pavão na música, feito pela Vox Media . Percebemos que, para a ideia se concretizar, nós precisaríamos ser parte da arte – algo que definitivamente foi um esforço pois, nossas fotos no Instagram não somos o tipo de gente que quer fotos profissionais estilo rockstar . Tivemos a visão de uma capa rica, romântica, brega, kitsch, porque em nossa opinião o disco é muito rico e é a coisa toda é uma grande carta de amor. Enfim, nos empolgamos pensando que se alguém fizer outro documentário sobre a cadeira pavão, talvez A Tiny House seja mencionado, haha.

Sobre a presença online, notei que você interage até mesmo com detratores. 

No geral, gosto de interagir com os fãs sempre que possível. É um pouco estranho, pois nós dois somos muito introvertidos e reservados. Mas, ao mesmo tempo, somos fãs de música assim como aqueles que nos seguem e sabemos como é enviar uma mensagem para sua banda favorita e torcer por respostas. Sabemos o valor e o efeito que isso pode ter para nós. Somos apenas pessoas comuns, e não ligamos em entrar em debates quando podemos, pois valorizamos o apoio e amor que os fãs nos deram ao longo dos anos. É o mínimo que podemos fazer.

Também tentamos interagir com os críticos, como você disse, por algumas razões. Primeiro, devo admitir, é tentar interagir com eles de forma humana, o mais gentil possível, deixar saberem que apreciamos o feedback deles se for construtivo, e quem sabe ganhar alguns pontinhos e convencê-los a nos dar outra chance, haha. Segundo, não gosto do discurso de negatividade na Internet e acredito firmemente que podemos melhorar quanto a expressar opiniões, engajar em debates ou discussões. Então quando vejo tuítes ou postagens que não são apenas negativas, mas violentas (e logo, completamente desinformadas), a vontade de responder surge rápido.

Não é algo que faço com frequência, nem no passado fiz – porque nunca senti que tinha plataformas para me expressar. Mas dentro do contexto da nossa banda, os comentários são mais próximos e me fazem querer responder. Óbvio que a última coisa que desejo é começar uma gritaria com alguém, então procuro manter as respostas leves, objetivas, sem apontar dedos. Algo que gostaria que mais pessoas tivessem em sua mentalidade de comunicação é que um comentário tipo “essa banda é uma merda, deviam morrer” não é só rude, como também desrespeitoso com nossas próprias opiniões. Se acreditamos no que fazemos, então devemos a nós mesmos representar isso com o mesmo respeito que nos dão. Por exemplo, você fez um bolo do qual se orgulha e vai servir para as pessoas: você pode levá-lo à mesa, explicar e mostrar o tanto de dedicação que colocou nele ou apenas jogá-lo ali e dizer “tá aí, aproveitem, não me importo”.

E os fãs são bem apaixonados pelo Sweet Trip – tanto o Velocity como o You Will Never Know Why são álbuns do ano no RateYourMusic , ambos têm mais avaliações que qualquer disco do Bob Marley e Madonna também. Até vi alguém desejando que vocês fossem “famosos como o Tame Impala” por lá…

Somos muito agradecidos pela comunidade do RYM e por todas as coisas legais que disseram sobre nossa música lá. De várias maneiras, o amor dos usuários de lá teve efeito no nosso retorno. Não sei sobre ser do tamanho do Tame Impala, porém, haha. Definitivamente não temos objetivos como esse, mas o carinho das pessoas é super legal.

Não consideram fazer shows quando possível?

Adoraríamos, quando for seguro.

Com quais bandas vocês gostariam de tocar? Ouvi que você é fã das LOONA! 

Adoraríamos tocar com nossos ídolos, Slowdive, MBV, etc. Acho que seria uma experiência fantástica para nós. Na verdade não ouvimos LOONA nem k-pop. Creio que você se refere ao remix que postei no Twitter , mas fiz aquilo só de brincadeira. Um pessoal estava dizendo que iríamos produzir o próximo disco da LOONA, o que achei engraçado, aí aquele trechinho foi só pra mostrar como poderia ser.

Acho curioso que o disco novo continua a ideia de usar o título como certa espécie de afirmação: teve o “slogan” de Velocity : Design : Comfort , o mistério de You Will Never Know Why e agora a combinação de títulos de músicas, que suponho ser uma metáfora para os laços entre vocês. Foi algo planejado?  

É uma boa observação, nunca havia pensado nisso. Sim, creio que há algo que tentamos passar para as pessoas com os títulos. Para nós, tudo que transforma um conjunto de canções em um disco tem uma história a contar, ou (a sugestão) para as pessoas criarem uma. Com o disco novo, queríamos um nome que representasse as canções de algum jeito, e acabou sendo o certo no fim. De fato transmite a conexão profunda que temos.

O título de um disco ou canção é tão importante quanto a música em si para nós, não apenas um identificador ou um resumo da canção – ou do refrão, como parece ser a regra. Títulos podem reforçar as emoções da música, ou tornar seu significado mais vago, que é algo que adoramos fazer. De toda forma, A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals representa as conexões emocionais entre pessoas em um ambiente humilde e seguro.

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Sweet Trip Return With Two New Songs: Listen

By Noah Yoo

Dream pop/electronica band Sweet Trip have returned with a pair of new tracks. Listen to “ Walkers Beware! We Drive Into the Sun ” and “ Stab-Slow ” below. The former track will appear on Roberto Burgos and Valerie Cooper’s forthcoming album A Tiny House, In Secret Speeches, Polar Equals , their first LP in 12 years. It’s set to be released late spring 2021 via Darla.

In addition to releasing new music, Sweet Trip are also reissuing their 2009 album You Will Never Know Why with remastered audio and three bonus tracks on January 22. The band’s sophomore album Velocity : Design : Comfort has garnered something of a cult following in the years since its release, leading to a vinyl reissue last year.

Read Pitchfork’s list of “ The 30 Best Dream Pop Albums .”

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By Madison Bloom

Top listeners:

A Deep Dive With Sweet Trip

today April 18, 2020

By: James Lanik Music Journalist

You’ve undoubtedly heard the ageless saying at one point in your life that “music just isn’t the same these days”, or “my generation’s music was just better.” That can be debated all day, but it’s hard to argue that now is a better time to listen to music. For the first time ever, the entire world’s library of musical works is a few swipes away, and that has huge implications for the bands that never got the fifteen seconds of fame that they deserved.

Sweet Trip is a musical project formed in San Francisco back in the early 90s by Roberto Burgos, Viet Le, Valerie Cooper, and Aaron Porter. Today, it only consists of Mr. Burgos and Ms. Cooper, but in the time since their conception, they’ve created some of the most timeless pieces of shoegaze and IDM music in their scene. Their 2003 opus, Velocity:Design:Comfort , was a journey of satisfyingly head-bang worthy guitar riffs filtered through a digital prism of disorienting and glitchy sound bytes. It’s the sound of two distinctly 90s music scenes on a high speed collision course, and the resulting chaos is tough to put down.

That album has since become a cult classic among the internet’s music forums, but upon its arrival, it received little fanfare. For most of Sweet Trip’s most active years in the 90s and 00s, they continue to fly under the radar and remained an underground gem. But now, after an eleven year hiatus following their 2009 follow up record, You Will Never Know Why , Sweet Trip have returned, and this time, many more are listening.

—–

James: Well thank you guys for joining me, this was great timing actually. I wanted to do this interview before I even saw that you guys were out of hiatus and prepping a V:D:C reissue and a new album.

Valerie: Where have you been?! Haha!

J: I’ve been listening to y’all for a while but I hadn’t been following the socials til recently so you’ll have to cut me some slack!

V: In other words you have a real life to take care of!

J:  If only that was the case! I know that Sweet Trip used to consist of other members as well. Are you two working alone now?

V: Roby and Viet came first, then me. Aaron joined a little later, but now it’s just us two.

Roberto: Yeah they left the scene, Aaron owns a bar and has his own family, he just has way better things to do, haha! But we’re all still on great terms.

J: That’s good to hear. Mr. Burgos, before your time in Sweet Trip, you came from a background in hard hitting metal music. How did that influence the music you made in Sweet Trip? Was there a reason you decided to switch from pursuing metal in favor of the more shoegaze-y and IDM focused sound of the band?

R: I just sort of rode the wave and it led me to where I am right now. I really love metal, but I would never even dare play in a metal band, because it’s so incredibly difficult. For me, metal was a vehicle to learn how to play instruments. It taught me how to play the guitar decent enough to not sound stupid, but I would definitely say some of the intensity of metal kind of translates into the intensity of Sweet Trip’s sound.

J: I can definitely see it that way, especially in some of the extended interlude portions of V:D:C, where the sound starts off with a melodic dream pop-y sound, and then you have this gnarly three or four minute breakdown of this whirlwind of electronic walls of sound.

R: Yeah definitely! I mean, I personally never really look at how my favorite genres and artists influence the music we make, but you can definitely trace it going backwards. I started with metal, then in the early nineties, I guess you could say I saw the light? I was exposed to Sonic Youth, The Stone Roses, The Cure, ya know? Before I met Valerie, I was in this weird limbo of wanting to do something with metal but being equally interested in ‘90s alternative. And then I met Valerie, and she comes from a totally different background of like indie rock, goth, shoegaze and all that. In a way, she fished me out of the water.

J: You guys have taken a few different stylistic turns over your three studio albums. Based on your most recent release, “You Will Never Know Why”, how would you describe the music you make? In as abstract or as concrete terms as you’d like.

R: I guess I could explain it like this. There’s never a conscious decision to make a song or record sound like X Y or Z, it just kinda happens? For You Will Never Know Why , I think we just found ourselves in a more simplistic mode, where we found ourselves playing instruments more. Moving away from a lot of the more synthetic, computerized stuff just kinda happened naturally. It’s kind of like a chicken and the egg scenario. At some point, we started to like playing our instruments a little more, that influenced the songs that were coming out, and the songs that were coming out were making us play our instruments even more.  We eventually just got to the point where we were just focusing more on the basic and raw elements.

V: It was a more traditional approach to making music, it was really our first time as a band trying to make songs with a Verse-Chorus structure, so there was a lot more practicing and memorization. With V:D:C , it was a phrase here and there, grab a mic and record, maybe Roby will throw in some bits and pieces here, or throw away what he doesn’t like. Who knows? Recording that album was a lot more relaxed because it was so improvisational. With You Will Never Know Why being more traditional in structure, it’s a lot harder to hide those imperfections.

J: The way you explained it made a lot of sense. The reason I asked was because to me, it feels like those two albums, while they definitely came from the same band, were born from completely different headspaces. I mean being six years apart in release, there must have been a lot of experiences in that time period that shifted your musical inspirations.

V: It was a very different headspace, it’s true. When V:D:C was in the works, I remember me and Roby would go to a drum n’ bass show one night, and then the next night we’d go to a shoegaze show, and the sounds and culture were just totally different between those two scenes. With the drum n’ bass shows for instance, here they are with their cargo pants, Vans t-shirts and DC shoes, and everyone is there for the floor shaking low end bass sounds. And then at the shoegaze shows you get all these ear-searing guitars and melodies. At those Slowdive concerts, you’d get those kids with the more sophisticated fashion, black turtlenecks, hair in a bob, etc. But we loved both worlds so much, and I think that’s kind of why V:D:C blended those two worlds together.

J: How did you guys manage to get noticed by Darla Records and have your debut album be a part of their “Bliss Out” series?

V: We made like 50 cassette tapes with songs from Halica, I don’t think Halica was done as an album yet, but we had like 5 songs and finished it and sent it in to a bunch of different indie labels. It’s a numbers game, ya know? You either hear back or not, and Darla was one of the first to show genuine interest, and so we met with them. We were attracted to the fact that they had a global distribution and they were really well connected with other indie labels like March Records and Labrador. We decided to sign with them and the rest is history! They’ve always been super willing to help us out.

J: So how active is Sweet Trip right now? Obviously I’m sure touring plans got put on the backburner, but are y’all diving headfirst into the recording process now?

R: Somewhere in the middle, haha. We’ve been active again for about 6 months after a pretty big hiatus. It’s still an ongoing process, but it’s definitely been getting a lot of momentum.

V: Yeah, it was about six months ago that we reconvened, and the next thing you know, Roby is on his Twitter account telling everyone we’re working on a new album, so, ya know, we can’t turn back now, haha!

J: The hype is here now, so now you gotta deliver!

V: Yep, and tourwise, at least before all this COVID-19 stuff started happening we had some really cool shows booked in San Francisco and Los Angeles, but a lot of that is getting pushed back now. But for now, we’re looking into live streaming, maybe on Instagram or Twitch.

J: Were y’all going to take the tour nationwide?

V: Oh yeah, we wanted to, I know that we got asked to do a festival in Texas, we were going to start out local and then expand it from there, but hopefully we get to do that later.

J: Are there any emerging acts right now you find particularly engaging that people aren’t paying enough attention to?

V: I don’t know if this counts, but these two DJs from San Francisco called Dyatron Industries are lifelong vinyl collectors, and they’re a huge inspiration for me and I find loads of cool music through them. They spin everything from disco, electro, darkwave, synthwave, industrial,  junglewave, all that cool stuff. I don’t really feel like enough people are paying enough attention to them. I mean they have a Mixcloud account and they stream off of Vault Radio and all that, but I feel like more people should listen to DJs like them. I’m definitely inspired by DJs and what they play because they play all these obscure bands that I never would have found otherwise. But bandwise, I like this band called Pinkshinyultrablast, they’re kinda shoegaze-y, but at times they kinda have a metal undertone to some of their music. They’re Russian so they’re not well known here, but they do tours over in the UK and Russia. They kind of remind me of when we were starting out, trying to do things differently when no one’s paying attention, and then years later, people start coming out of the shadows to say they really like our stuff.

R: I totally agree with Valerie about the Diatron Industry DJs, those guys are super awesome and diverse. Their sets are kind of like going to a music library and just being overwhelmed with the sheer amount of music you never knew was out there. It’s a learning experience but it’s also very enjoyable. As far as bands go, the last thing I was blown away by was the Hand Habits record that came out late last year. They did a live show on KEXP and that was such a gorgeous performance, I’ve been a fan ever since.

J: What y’all said about some of the bands you like who are doing new and interesting stuff while no one is looking really stuck with me. I personally feel that your work as a band has been criminally overlooked by many people over the years, including many notable publications. Have you noticed a resurgence of interest in your music with the rise of online music forums and discussions that give fans of your work a bigger platform to discuss it? (Especially when compared to the initial release of your albums.)

R: I think maybe you nailed it, because me and Valerie have been pondering why is this resurgence happening? Like what is driving all this interest? And for some strange, stupid reason it didn’t occur to me that it’d be the internet.

V: There is definitely a ground swell happening now, and a lot of it is still based around word of mouth and college radio, you know stuff like that. And I mean, we’re still fairly underground, we’re not hearing from, you know, Pitchfork, KEXP,–who’s that guy doing the YouTube reviews?

J: Anthony Fantano? He has actually mentioned y’all before.

R: Has he really? I didn’t realize that.

V: But yeah I mean even though we aren’t being approached by big media publications, I do see a big groundswell happening around our music and that’s super cool to see, and it’s because of people like you.

J: I’ve heard through the grapevine that you guys are working on another Sweet Trip project together. With this being the longest period between album releases for you guys yet, what do you hope to accomplish with this release, and how can we expect this outing to be different from your last? Have your experiences and travels since then influenced the music making process in any way? Are you bringing in any outside musicians into the recording process, or is this strictly an artistic endeavor between the two of you?

V: This time it just feels like a much more extroverted process. Like ever since people on the internet started taking note of us, people have been asking us to come back. And now that it’s actually happened, we’re just trying to share pieces of what we recorded here and there, and it’s a super cool feeling to involve people now. Before, when we recorded our earlier albums, we didn’t have the internet to help people find our music so it kind of just felt isolated, we’d create the CD, and who knows who was gonna buy it? We didn’t know who the audience was, but now we do, and we feel the love from you guys.

R: We really didn’t know who we were recording for, that’s totally true. And now, thinking back on it, I do remember thinking, “who’s really gonna get it”? I was glad Darla saw something in us, but I was always curious who we were making music for, and it was never really clear to me until now that all this love and support has been brewing for several, and now I kind of sorta have the answers, and it puts a face to that group of people, which is really cool to me. I think our music appeals a lot to–I feel like outsiders is a terrible word–but you know, that group of people that really invest themselves in music because they feel it’s the best way to express themselves, especially obscure forms of music like shoegaze and stuff like that. I love finally having the answers to who’s listening out there.

J: I know I’m looking forward to it, I really hope y’all get the recognition you deserve this time around. Thank you guys for taking the time to talk with me!

V: Absolutely!

R: Yeah, thank you man, it really does mean a lot to us, we’re looking forward to seeing where we go next.

Sweet Trip’s music is available to stream on all major platforms. “Velocity:Design:Comfort” will be reissued on vinyl on May 1st, 2020.

Featured Image by Sweet Trip

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JOHN ELLSWORTH BYRD on April 24, 2020

James, Super glad to have run across this article! I ran across Sweet Trip in my Spotify recommendations, of all things and I seriously can’t get enough. I used to be super into My Bloody Valentine and Lush, but I recently have become interested in a few EDM producers like Madeon and these guys REALLY bridge the divide between live music and DJ/Producer/Electronica. Crazy that you published this so recently, and that you’re here in San Marcos. Excited at the prospects of new music. Unfortunately, we will all have to wait a few months for live performances. If you have any similar recommendations, please let me know.

John Jaybird Captain MAZing

link Pingback: Blissbreak Music (Breakgaze? Blissbeat?), a Newish Genre With a Long History + 9 Tracks to Check Out

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