Moontype

City: Chicago
Country: Illinois, USA
Genre: Indie
Styles: Alternative

on hashbrandnew.com since December 10, 2020

Earthy and earnest tunes. sometimes hard, sometimes soft, always sincere purveyor of poppy liquid weirdness. makes its home on the porous border between dissonance and quiet beauty.

The three players in Chicago’s Moontype orbited each other for years before they came in phase. Inspired by artists like Adrianne Lenker and Gillian Welch, Margaret McCarthy recorded the EP bass tunes at home in an apartment over the town’s optician, releasing it upon graduation. A week later she migrated even farther west to Chicago, where Ben Cruz and Emerson Hunton had already enmeshed themselves in several projects, from avant-garde ensembles to a country group.

Ben was instantly impressed by Margaret’s songs, at once “challenging and unlike anything I had played before.” The duo decided to try performing together, but knew this special music would be even better fortified with drums. Emerson was the obvious choice—as Ben puts it, “He’s our great friend and also the best drummer we know. Who else do you call?” Moontype-as-trio gigged around town, eventually embarking on a first fall tour in Emerson’s Prius. On that trip, they felt the music morph into something living, and the care and trust between them intensified.

- Sadie Dupuis