FLAMANGO BAY recently announced details of their debut EP The Fool, set to be released on 13th May via 0800-MOSHI-MOSHI.
Today, they share the EP's centrepiece and new single "Lucky Star".
""Lucky Star" represents the feeling of wanting something to go well so bad that you’d do anything to remain optimistic, even if it means completely immersing yourself in your own delusions and fantasy," says songwriter Ikaika Gunderson. "We used common motifs and symbolism both in the lyrics (stars, four leaf clovers, lady bugs, spells and magic etc.) and musically (the song is in 7/4 time) to get across the idea of being optimistic and lucky."
“I wanted to make the catchiest and most accessible pop song in an odd time signature that I could,” adds Gunderson. “I thought it would be funny if I wrote the happiest song I possibly could, but it was actually really sad.”
Musically, the LA band cite modern surf rock acts like Vampire Weekend and Peach Pit, indie acts Beach Bunny and Soccer Mommy, as well as flamboyancy of the likes of Lady Gaga, Tyler, the Creator and Angel Olsen, as influences on "Lucky Star".
"It's the most delusional and epic song we’ve ever written, and it’s one of our favorites to perform," they say.
About Flamango Bay and The Fool
Flamango Bay was formed school by Ikaika Gunderson, Dash Goss Post, and Georgia Manou, and their debut EP is inspired by the fool card in tarot; five tracks loosely following an arc from being young, naive and optimistic before learning some harsh life lessons.
The band cite the likes of The Great Gatsby as an influence for its themes around the restrictive nature of blinkered hope, as well as Marvel’s Wandavision for its narrative arc that descends from a contented equilibrium to a fragmented and broken existence. Listeners will also note infectious hooks that lend more to the likes of Mitski and beabadoobee.
“In a more general way we saw our psyches and emotional state about the pandemic reflected in the EP,” says the band. “We graduated high school in the pandemic, started college in the pandemic, moved to LA in the pandemic. All these monumental life events that were supposed to be joyous and exciting were overshadowed by this really depressing world event.”
But beneath it all lies the Bay Area, taking pride of place in the group’s name and influencing everything they do, most clearly in epic closer "Fishing for the Sun" (released last year as a standalone single). Written by Gunderson amidst a gender identity crisis, it was the supportive environment cultivated by the prominent genderqueer and transgender element of the group’s local music scene that allowed them to explore feelings they suggest they may have pushed away for a long time otherwise.
“If not for these activists and people of marginalized identities normalizing being themselves, we wouldn’t have had the groundwork to express ourselves and our art.”
The Fool is the result of that groundwork: five tracks that mix an abundance of pop smarts with an eclecticism of styles and – most importantly – a heart and emotional pull that’s impossible to resist. The EP will be released 13th May.
0800-MOSHI-MOSHI is a new digital-only Moshi Moshi Records imprint for showcasing fresh talent. Initially set up as a means to share work by musicians made during lockdown, the format proved to be an excellent way to get music out quickly, without many of the limitations imposed by a more traditional label set-up. It harks back to the heady days of the Moshi Moshi Singles Club and so, in the same spirit, post-lockdown it continued as a vehicle for developing artists.
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