PREMIERE: PYSCHIC SELVES - "RIDER"

Brooklyn post-punk band Psychic Selves are about to follow up last summer's Lucid Night EP with a four-track Cassingle tape via Time Castle Records. Despite multiple lineup changes over the past year, the band has continued to grind through NYC basement shows & bar gigs, honing in on their sound & pinpointing exactly who they are. "Rider", the second single from the tape, is melancholic psych song carried by frontman Pepito Gomez's wispy falsetto & a reverberated guitar riff that recalls images of the desolate landscape in George Miller's Mad Max. The tubular guitar melody weaves through lanes, crosses dystopian state lines & drifts into haze of 60s-inspired psychedelic cacophony that shoegazers of the nineties & naughts might even salivate on their sneakers over. This is until Gomez pumps the breaks, settles the dust & coos "killing me won't solve anything".

Pep let us in on what inspired "Rider":

"I really wanted to write a song about the apocalypse... I was playing a video game called Fallout at the time, which takes place in this radioactive wasteland. The song is about trying to live in a world where you have to survive with mutants & the fuckin’ walking dead. It’s totally not relatable, but that's the point."

[Read our full interview with Pep from Psychic Selves here.]

The video for "Rider" [directed by Luke Carr] is a stoned collection of frames documenting the boys of Psychic Selves passing a blunt around, trudging through Brooklyn & hanging out at Rockaway Beach. If you're into skateboards, surfing or weed—this video might be right up your alleyway. Check it out below.

Psychic Selves play Winooski, VT, on Saturday, August 26th with The Dream Eaters at The Monkey House. Entry to the event is $5-10. RSVP to the event here.

- hope all is well