by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
There’s a lot to love about Austin’s Queen Serene, a band that has truly blurred the lines between aggressive shoegaze, post-punk, and lo-fi alternative rock. Last year the quartet released their debut full length, a confident self-titled record that we described in the album’s premiere as “gorgeous chaos”. Wasting little time, the band are back at it, getting ready to release their second album, appropriately titled 2, sometime this Fall. It’s an album that expands their palette into artier territory, embracing volume and repetition at times, the results both immersive and intricate. Queen Serene’s are abrasive but dynamic, their limitless noise is manifested with a tempered grace.
“Glowing,” the first single from 2, is a bulldozer of a shoegaze song, opening with a pummeling sludge riff before receding into more delicate territory. The band feels detached from any axis, wavering away from the tightly coiled destruction into a wonky groove that fits the vocal melody to perfection. The resonant progressions bend over an elastic rhythm, reminiscent of classic Beauty Pill but influenced in actuality by My Bloody Valentine, Can, and Swans. A piercing mixlayered carnage and dream state bliss, Queen Serene allow the song to unhinge and unravel in reckless delight.
The band are celebrating the single’s release on Sunday, July 28th at Hotel Vegas in Austin with Water Damage and Variety.