Home > Bands > Exitmusic
Exitmusic
Icon-facebook Icon-twitter Icon-youtube Icon-web
Follow Band

Exitmusic

Hometown: Brooklyn
Tags: indie, female vocalists, check later

Sometimes, listening to Exitmusic, it’s hard to tell whether the goosebumps you’re getting are from the moments that are chillingly beautiful and melodic, or the ones that are aching and guttural or the ones that are creepily sparse and disembodied. On their breathtaking new album, Passage, The New York City duo – Aleksa Palladino and Devon Church—doesn’t care when the chill runs down your spine, they just hope their music provokes some kind of primal feeling. With Passage, the two tethers that make up Exitmusic’s sound — one of stirring atmospherics, and one of thoughtful pop — are let to bow further out than before. They are, however, also pulled into a tighter, sharper knot at the center.

Church and Palladino started writing together several years ago, when Church moved to New York following a year teaching English in Taiwan and India. “We had a funny dynamic musically, at first,” says Church, who grew up in Winnipeg. “I was listening to things that had elements sonically of what we’re doing now—Radiohead’s Kid A, that second Sigur Ros album, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Warp Records electronic stuff. But all I had to work with at the time was an acoustic guitar. Meanwhile, Aleksa was recording all these really interesting, odd arrangements on her four-track that would be about a minute long and only have one movement in them, and it sounded more like what I was into than what I was doing.”

Exitmusic’s Secretly Canadian debut came last fall: a four-song collection called From Silence that drew critical raves both at home and overseas. The Guardian praised its “tsunami of pop noise” and the NME pronounced it “a gloriously luscious listen,” while Nylon Magazine called From Silence “rare and beautiful.”

But whereas that effort was recorded entirely at Church and Palladino’s Brooklyn apartment, their new full-length, Passage, is a major step forward for the duo in terms of both recording technique and songwriting. With help from electronic musician Nicholas Shelestak, Church and Palladino spent several days this winter working with mixer Nicholas Vernhes (Dirty Projectors, Deerhunter) at his Rare Book Room studio, where they built on the duo’s beautiful, chilling aesthetic for a sound that is both more powerful and more nuanced. “I think there is something a bit more expansive in the new material,” says Church. “On ‘Passage,’ we cover a lot of emotional ground, and ‘White Noise’ and ‘Storms’ wound up having more pop elements in them than I think they would have had we recorded them a year ago.”

Followers See all

Grooveshark.com

Loading...
  • thedelimagazine
  • mawarren88
  • KCRW
  • TheOwlMag
  • Fluxblog
  • Guardian UK's New Band Of The Day
  • AmyMBarrera
Upcoming Events Rss
Past Events

Suggest better video/songs


Comments

You must Login to post comments.

  • TheOwlMag

    TheOwlMag on Exitmusic

    4 months ago

    Exitmusic Passage [Secretly Canadian]

    Aleksa Palladino and Devon Church had a fortuitous meeting on a train in Canada when they were 18 years old. Their chance meeting sparked a whirlwind courtship, eventual marriage, and the genesis of their creative relationship as Exitmusic. Passage, the band’s debut full-length album, grants admission into the couple’s secluded Inception-like world they’ve collectively built that is both escapist and pragmatic.

    The world of Exitmusic is colored in black and white where beautifully creepy vocals starkly contrast against a menacing soundscape. Even the track names on Passage act as little guideposts demarcating points of light as Exitmusic’s subconscious exists in limbo. On “City,” Palladino’s androdgynous vocals twist and turn with varied trills and modulations in pitch enveloping her in raw emotion leaving her almost breathless and vulnerable. Passage borders on feeling a bit melodramatic with the rapid rise and cessation of multiple layers of guitars, drums, and keyboards but there’s no denying the evocative nature of Palladino’s voice. Close your eyes and enter the world of Exitmusic.

    more at theowlmag.com

  • Buzz Bands LA

    Buzz Bands LA on Exitmusic

    7 months ago

    Exitmusic , the husband-wife duo Devon Church and Aleksa Palladino, don't shy away from playing with that line between haunting and ethereal. It can always be heard in the exponential build-ups in their songs and it can be felt, if not seen, in their visual accompaniments. Teaming up with director Will Joines again, Exitmusic follows up the eerie "The Hours" clip with their new music video for "Passage." Locking down that dark cloud between horror film and cathartic beauty, the clip once again bounces between both shades of barren gray and fiery red. "Passage" is slated for a May 22 more here

  • mySpoonful

    mySpoonful on Exitmusic

    over 1 year ago

    The end of the world is coming and Exitmusic want to sing you a lullaby. Amidst the swells and echoes, the hollowness of time drips in a steady pulse, bleak and final yet exposing the beautiful vulnerability that is being human. Few bands can invoke such imagery, fewer still in such expert fashion. Their music is life and death, the rainy day and the sun that eventually breaks through the clouds. Within the powerful tenderness of their latest EP, From Silence, hope and despair come to marry in perfect harmony. And like life itself, when From Silence reaches its conclusion, you’ll find yourself wishing the end didn’t come so soon. more at myspoonful.com

    • Featured Venue

    • Featured