In 1995, Sonic Youth, 14 years into their career, and on the cusp of a breakthrough, released a new album, Washing machinewhich closed with an almost 20 minute song, 'The Diamond Sea'. Much of it is a free-form jam of slow-unfolding guitar noise. Seemingly aware of the obnoxious double-digit running time given heavily on commentary, the band released a radio edit of 'Diamond Sea', a pretty good if relatively sterile four-minute version that cuts through the fuss. His goal was achieved, to an extent: The song charted—though never higher than No. 23. Critical success abounded, but the mass market never quite caught on.
By the time Los Angeles band members Julie were born (about halfway between the release of “Diamond Sea” and the breakup of Sonic Youth in 2011), the brief promise of a mainstream moment for hard rock music, in in the wake of Nirvana's success, it was far on the back burner. Now it was the Obama years. Blast time for Coldplay fans, not so much for dissonance fans.
But enter Trump and dark clouds came, just like high school graduation. in 2019, as high school students, guitarist/vocalist Keyan Pourzand, bassist/vocalist Alexandria Elizabeth, and drummer Dillon Lee formed Julie. The band's first single, 'flutter', was released in 2020, a year in which talented young devotees of experimental rock music had plenty of reasons to leave the known world and flood the oceans.
Julie appeared fully formed on 'flutter', a tightly wound grunge-pop rager with Pourzand and Elizabeth trading off vocals, both delightfully dispassionate. This song, like most of the rest of their subsequent songs, was propelled by a completely ballistic drum performance from Lee. They were influenced by Sonic Youth, clearly, but they weren't too interested in that band's atonal rambling. Julie's power was controlled outside the gate.
Over the next three years, the group released a handful of EPs and singles, experimenting with slight changes in sound. One song might warp more tortured emo, another more triumphant shoegaze. The sharp flash of the Big Muff pedal is always present, but they never surrender to vague theatrics. They never make noodles too long. Only one song on the band's debut album, my anti-aircraft friendit counts over five minutes—and then only by three seconds. It seems like a generation (or two) since the heyday of their beloved breed of experimental rock, Julie have managed to craft songs that feel big and chunky, but actually blossom and disintegrate in short order. You can fit many Julie songs into one “Diamond Sea”. No radio processing required.
