Girl Scout

"There is an urgency to Girl Scout’s garage-rock sound that demands you pay attention." – NME
"Perhaps the buzziest four-some in Swedish music right now." - CLASH
“woozy, expansive subtlety." – The Line Of Best Fit

Stockholm indie/pop four-piece - GIRL SCOUT - have announced an extensive run of UK shows this Autumn.

Jumping on the Coach Party bandwagon, the two bands will be embarking on a 13 date stretch together between 26th September - 13th October. With an additional stop at London’s Rough Trade East, Girl Scout will also be launching their brand new EP: ‘Granny Music’ en-route. Details for all dates can be found below - with tickets on sale now.

The ingeniously-titled ‘Granny Music’, the second EP by Girl Scout will be released on 29th September, and will be preceded by the sumptuous new single “Bruises” (out 13th September).

Recalling the tenderest moments of Alvvays, boygenius, or Soccer Mommy, upcoming single “Bruises” is a spectral, brittle indie-rock ballad to rival the best. Showcasing lead singer Emma Jansson's vocal spectrum hitting new heartbreaker heights, it’s a song that offers winsome reflection beyond their years on those feelings of getting older and seeing those closest to you in a whole new light. As guitarist Viktor Spasov explains of the track:

"'Bruises' is a song about reaching a certain age where you realise that the grown ups and people around you aren’t really grown ups but just kids stuck in older bodies. It’s a song about trying to understand and forgive the wrongdoings or faults that people close to you may have and, in some ways, the whole track is a reminder for myself to try and choose love and patience instead of anger and irritation".

“Bruises” is the latest track to be lifted from the band’s hotly anticipated second EP ‘Granny Music’ and follows recent singles “Boy In Blue” and “Monster”, both of which will also feature.

A collection that sees the Swedes honing their craft and breaking new ground both sonically and lyrically, the band say of ‘Granny Music’:

"There’s some heartland sounding stuff going on, and there’s a power-ballad, and then of course we have a couple rockers in there, too. We wanted to explore some new ground without abandoning the foundation we built with the first EP."

Moving away from the nostalgic yearning and anxiousness that defined their debut, this time Girl Scout have found inspiration in the nuances of childhood memories, family dynamics and romantic relationships, with the band opening-up on more personal stories across its five tracks. “The dynamic spectrum of Granny Music is wider; there are both softer and heavier songs on this EP" they add.

Like its predecessor, the ‘Real Life Human Garbage’ EP, ‘Granny Music’ was produced by Ali Chant, with both set to be released as a special split vinyl together on 29th September (via made records).

It’s damn near impossible to start a band these days, and it’s even more impossible to actually make great music once you do. Swedish four-piece Girl Scout are a band quite happy to defy the odds. Throwing down the gauntlet with a rave received debut EP last year, ‘Real Life Human Garbage’, the band has earned comparisons to everyone from The Breeders to Snail Mail, all while embellishing a sonic finesse that, often, outstretches those names in technicolor 4K. NME, DORK, Under The Radar and more tipped them as ones to watch 2023, others augur them with the same shooting star career as Wet Leg. Features in Clash, The Times, The Guardian, Gaffa, Atwood, Billboard, and too many more to name them all here sang the band's paean as one of the most innovative and energetic newcomers around. Their songs have aired on radio stations all over the world, from BBC 1 to 6 Music, P3, Amazing Radio, Triple J, Double J, FluxFM, Puls, egoFM and a lot more.

Girl Scout continue to weave the tapestry of a sound that has already become so big and unbelievable, pulling patient pleasures from eras they didn’t even exist in but have strong, reverberating reverence for. Their second EP ‘Granny Music’ arrives 29th September.

FURTHER PRAISE FOR GIRL SCOUT
“This band feels like the full alternative package!" – Jack Saunders, BBC1
"Girl Scout are the best new band in the world." – Paste Magazine
"So unstoppable; so unforgettable. Girl Scout sugar-coat nothing, and yet the resulting music is ecstatic" – Atwood Magazine
"Indie rock personified and made new again." – Consequence
"I love the way [‘Do You Remember Sally Moore’] ends up exploding. Wolf Alice-esque, real good stuff. Not just the instrumentation, the lead singer really goes for it, like an orchestral feeling all working in unison to make sure you're having a good time" – Jack Saunders, BBC1
"It’s not hard to believe they’ll smash it." – NME
"There is an urgency to Girl Scout’s garage-rock sound that demands you pay attention." – NME
"Translating anxious and awkward panics into breezy pop songs." – FLOOD
"Platonic ideal Swedish Indie-Rock." – The Guardian
"It feels like the work of a band that’s been around much longer, capturing everyday anxieties and memories of awkward moments with hooks to spare, recalling the likes of Alvvays and Belle and Sebastian." – Brooklyn Vegan
"Girl Scout’s sound is [...] woozy, expansive subtlety." – The Line Of Best Fit
"Bridging pop rock and bedroom pop to build these huge ‘monster’ jams that are perfect for singalongs. There’s still this wicked tenacity that shines through, letting us know that just because you can hear the hook, doesn’t mean you can’t rock it out really really loud." – Austin Town Hall
"’Monster’ is a little folky, and could have just been a great alt-pop kind of song. And then the guitars and drums come charging in and it turns into the best alt-rock song from 1995 released in 2023. It's a perfectly done loud/quiet/loud kind of song, but with the pop hooks of bands like Letters to Cleo, Weezer, and Veruca Salt." – If It’s Too Loud
"’Boy in Blue’ is catchy, electric, and refreshing, infusing a song about frustration and ghosting with the lightness and cleverness the band has become known  for in such a short amount of time." – Consequence of Sound
"Scuzzy, fuzzy and brilliant." – DORK
"Perhaps the buzziest four-some in Swedish music right now." - CLASH

Girl Scout - Bio
When lockdown hit the globe in early 2020, I couldn’t imagine anything great coming from it. Here in the
United States, just existing was a burden not so easily carried. I moved to a new city to try and save a
fractured relationship, which felt so insurmountable that all of my anxieties required new names. When we
all finally emerged from our homes, I was convinced that COVID-19 took ample stock and must have
harbored some shred of brilliance or hope. If you believe in destiny, then, perhaps, I can convince you that
four people in Stockholm, Sweden found each other through music during the pandemic and started
weaving the tapestry of a sound that would become so big and unbelievable.
I wish I could say that I stumbled upon Girl Scout’s music in some grand, mythological way. But, the truth
is, I was temping at a news desk job for a music magazine and an assignment to cover the band’s first single
was tossed into my inbox in the fall of 2022. I’d been doing music criticism for a little over a year at that
point, but I’d never had the opportunity to break a band in any American circle. The song I had to write
about was “Do You Remember Sally Moore?,” a bold, urgent first chapter in Girl Scout’s career. Any music
act would be happy to release a song like “Sally Moore” at any point in their career, let alone have it be their
introduction to the world.
Girl Scout—the quartet of Emma Jansson, Viktor Spasov, Per Lindberg, and Evelina Arvidsson
Eklind—carved out a near-monolithic space for their debut single, and it rewarded a near two full years of
being unable to tour the hits they were harboring. Jansson and Spasov met while studying jazz at the Royal
College of Music in Stockholm and would cover Burt Bacarach and Beatles songs while getting stoked on
Stranger Things and Big Thief together. They had aspirations of making their music partnership into
something larger-than-life, so they brought in their fellow Royal College of Music peer Eklind and Spassov’s
friend Lindberg to fill out the band’s architecture. They’ve earned comparisons to everyone from The
Breeders to Snail Mail, all while embellishing a sonic finesse that, often, outstretches those names in
technicolor 4K.
I would soon leave that news desk gig and take on an editor role at Paste, where we were able to be the first
American media outlet to cover Girl Scout with an extensive profile, dubbing them the Best of What’s Next
(and rightfully so). The problem with breaking a band is that you are tasked with convincing everyone else
why they should press play on a record—because, even in the streaming era, the amount of new music
coming in is always bountiful and, often, hard to keep up with. But Girl Scout’s debut EP, Real Life Human
Garbarge was a five-track wonder that required very little advocacy. Songs like “Run Me Over,” “Weirdo,”
and “Attenborough Beach” shine because they navigate harmonics through technical and structural
influence and do so in catchy, relentless ways. To be a student of jazz means you must understand what
possibilities a song can hold before you even perform it.
I have witnessed Jansson have many moments similar to when Paul McCartney fashioned “Get Back” out of
a humming melody in the Disney+ documentary of the same name. When I originally watched that clip a

few years ago, I considered it to be special, yes, but par for the course of, quite literally, any musician who is
also a songwriter. But to see it up close, to watch someone actually carve out a melody and verse and chorus
through playing an acoustic guitar into the speaker of their iPhone, is something miraculous that I’d
previously ignored. I’m not saying Jansson is the second-coming of McCartney, but Girl Scout exist
someplace in-between the worlds of the Beatles and jazz. There’s a perfection in there that still has potential,
as the band pulls patient pleasures from eras they didn’t even exist in but have strong, reverberating
reverence for. For every earworm hook, there is a meticulous, fine-tuned approach to song construction that
so few artists working today have even come close to mastering.
If you happened to be in Austin, Texas for SXSW in March 2023, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking
about. Across a half-dozen sets around the city, Girl Scout dazzled and stunned. Whether it was playing in
the courtyard of a lavish hotel or on-stage at a hole-in-the-wall bar downtown, no space could truly contain
the magnitude of the band’s ferocity. At Las Perlas, you could physically see folks in the audience opening
Spotify and saving Girl Scout to their library for post-show reminiscing. When Spasov played the
breakdown guitar sequence in “Do You Remember Sally Moore?” he nearly blew out his own
speaker—which I was lucky enough to be stationed next to. But watching people fall in love with Girl Scout
slowly and all at once, in different rooms, during the band’s first stint in the United States is one of my most
cherished memories.
Now, the band are gearing up to release their second EP this year. Granny Music is another five-song
continuation of their brilliance, shouldered by second single “Boy in Blue,” the best rock song of 2023 so far.
Few bands can so deftly procure brash, mountainous noise without subduing the melody, but Jansson and
Spasov’s songwriting chemistry has led to impeccable, unsuspecting algorithms within their own work. The
songs don’t go where you expect them to, yet, somehow, they sound as traditional and electric as anything a
young, hungry alt-rock has the resources to make. Children-of-divorce anthem “Mothers & Fathers” outlines
Spasov’s anomalous shredding that can echo the brightness of Jansson’s pipes without siphoning too much
of the light. “Monster” centers Jansson’s gutteral, rapturous, passionate vocals, while “Bruises” is a ballad
with country influence that showcases her professionally trained vocal spectrum. There’s a reason she
studied singing at the Royal College of Music: She can absolutely wail. And don’t get me started on
“Millionaire,” which crawls through halves of lo-fi into a hi-fi goodness filled out by Jansson coiling her
warbles into a trumpet. It’s like watching a demo transform into a mixed and mastered masterpiece in three
minutes.
It’s damn near impossible to start a band these days, and it’s even more impossible to actually make great
music once you do. Girl Scout figured out the formula before even making a full-length LP. Their trajectory
arrives without a ceiling. Perhaps the moon is the only viable landing spot for Jansson, Spasov, Lindberg, and
Eklind. Perhaps that is too minimal of a distance, as well.

—Matt Mitchell