Peel x Climax
Los Angeles duo Peel have shared “Climax,” the latest preview off their debut album Acid Star, out March 29th. Inspired by the 2018 Gaspar Noé movie of the same name, the song is an urgent blend of jagged guitar stabs and disco-inspired drumming. The accompanying video see’s the band performing the song, captured on grainy VHS against the concrete backdrop of their downtown Los Angeles loft. Paste Magazine described the track as a “unique convergence of post-punk, electronica and psychedelia.”
The creative partnership of Sean Cimino and Isom Innis, their bond was initially formed as touring members of Foster The People (now both official members live & on record). The two developed a musical language all their own over the years, ideas coalescing organically until the eventual birth of Peel. Inspired in part by genre-bending Creation Records bands like Primal Scream and Madchester groups like Happy Mondays, Acid Star expands on the industrial edge of early Peel, adding layers of psychedelia, electronica, and even reverb soaked freak folk, as seen on the title track.
"The sonic landscape of Climax nods to our post-punk roots, while the spirit and rhythm propel us forward into the realm of club and dance music” shares Cimino. “The lyrics are inspired by the Gaspar Noe movie ‘Climax’ and a bizarre rave I went to in Mexico City,” explains Innis. “The movie is about a dance party gone wrong because someone spikes the punch with acid and everyone freaks out, but our song flips the perspective - a psychedelic dance party gone right where everyone has fun. At the rave I was navigating this really dark dilapidated industrial building trying to find the basement where the dance floor was. It was like a crowded maze with all these hazardous drop offs and dead ends. That tone came out in Climax, the alarming but exciting feeling of dancing into the unknown.”