JUST before Christmas, Backseat Mafia had the absolute privilege of premiering “Like Heaven”, a brilliant surge of dream pop haze and melody from Graywave, the musical project of the West Midlands’ Jess Webberley. We’ll let you into a little secret: she’s a bit ace.
Jess is shaping for the release of Graywave’s debut EP, Planetary Shift, which she’s looking to release sometime around March; in advance of which she’s dropping “Before”, the concluding track from the EP, today.
The second track to get an advance reveal from that forthcoming EP, it’s also, we’re reliably informed, the concluding number; and an obsidian-dark and beautiful nugget it is too.
Shorter than most Graywave material to date, clocking in at under three minutes, it’s full of that thrill and dusky elegance you got from the Cocteau Twins circa Head Over Heels: that noir edge, building into fuzz to make you shiver.
Jess says: “’Before’ tackles the subject of anxiety and the feeling of regression. It is about the realisation that you cannot always escape negative feelings and events.
“This song was a way to express how I feel when I get particularly anxious and start thinking about all the negatives in my life and the world – expressing that through lyrics and music really helped me deal with it.”
Tracking back is also recommended, over at Graywave’s Bandcamp page: she has a clutch of single track releases from the past 18 months or so, including the dark drama of “Afternoon Escapism”, which could almost be Xmal Deutschland; through to the raw-edged and heartsore shoegaze of “Rain”.
You can follow Graywave on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram; that’s a good idea, with what promises to be a very fine EP due soon – and she’s signed for Brisbane’s excellent False Peak Records, a real treasure of a label, so it can only be onward and upward.
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