Graveyard Club share new music at The Current
by Andrea Swensson and Kayla Song
July 22, 2019
Performing songs off their upcoming album Goodnight Paradise, synthpop band Graveyard Club brought feelings of melancholy nostalgia to The Current studio with Matt Schufman on lead vocals and synths, Michael Wojtalewicz on guitar, Amanda Zimmerman on bass, and Cory Jacobs on drums.
Later this week on Friday, July 26, the quartet will be having a release show at the Fine Line Music Cafe with The Ocean Blue, DJ Jake Rudh, and producer Andy Thompson--who has worked with big Minnesota names like Jeremy Mesersmith. This record was the first time the band had an official producer to aid them from the critical early stages to the finished recording.
"I think he brings the mix the ability to collaborate," Wojtalewicz said about Thompson. "He totally gets the vision we're going for and is able to kind of nurture our best impulses and politely kind of nix our worst impulses. So, it feels like there's a relationship of trust there that is just super easy to work with."
One might describe their latest album, especially songs like "It Hurts" and "Finally Found" that they performed for The Current session, as something that could be the soundtrack behind a montage of polaroid pictures of Stranger Things characters having a beach day. It may be the band's unique embodiment of 50s crooners vibes as well as a love of 80s synthetic sounds.
"There's sort of this marriage of like the idea of let's do this weird haunted oldies sound, but let's have them dance to it and play all these synths you have laying around too," Wojtalewicz said. "I think Matt's and Amanda's vocals kind of gel those sounds together."
Though the band has made a point to not get too personal with their past work, Schufman said he couldn't help it with this album what with all the changes he went through this past year. "For the first time in my life I lived alone," he said. "So, I had all this time to like, think and think over my life and just think through the changes that I was going through. So, I think a lot of that is reflected in the lyrics of this record particularly."
Watch them perform "It Hurts," "Finally Found," "William," and more off of their new album at the Fine Line on Friday for their release show.
Resources
Graveyard Club - official website
Graveyard Club and The Ocean Blue with DJ Jake Rudh, July 26, 2019 - event information
