fantasy of a broken heart

The EP was recorded in Brooklyn, Mexico City, and Los Angeles; mostly at home perched on the couch or the floor. Our friend and fantastic engineer Nick Noneman who worked on Feats of Engineering had us in his studio for two days in which we worked with our friends Kaylee Stenberg (Ethel Cain) and Gabe Stout. Nick was a dear friend during the aforementioned quarantine times in Los Angeles and was present when the buds of some of these songs first developed.

Also making her first appearance on fantasy recordings is Kelsea Feder (Blums), who currently plays keys in the live band and has been an essential part of this era of the group.
The EP was mixed by Nate Amos (Water From Your Eyes, This is Lorelei) and mastered by Ruben Radlauer (Model/Actriz). We’re lucky to have made the project with close friends in close quarters. It’s our most bedroom project to date and feels all the more personal by the nature in which it was recorded, mostly Al and I writing in the comfort of home or a hotel room on the road. We’re super excited about how it turned out.

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"Born in a cloud of smoke, fueled by the burn of multiple failed relationships, and recorded in intimate settings across the world, Chaos Practitioner is the most bombastic collection of material we’ve ever attempted to complete. The songs orbit around a simple mantra repeated across the EP: “You want it but you’ll never get ahead of it.” It’s easy to feel as though we constantly live in the shadow of expectation, while life itself feels like a never-ending melee of chaotic occurrences attempting to derail any sense of center. Why aspire to anything?

This project feels like a swan dive into such a reality. The songs are a marriage between honesty and nonsense, revealing fantasy at our truest lyrically and musically. There’s a full blown autotuned lounge number. There’s a largely instrumental math rock blaster conceived after Bailey got too high while watching a live version of “Layla” twenty times in a row. There are guest appearances from our friends Brutus VIII and Current Joys popping up as unexpectedly as the unfortunately placed orchestra hit. Do all these things work together? Practice a little chaos, why don’tcha?

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"the fantasy of a broken heart’s new EP, Chaos Practitioner, follows their explosive debut album, Feats of Engineering (2024), building on the latter’s kooky but sincere narrative chops while charting new aural directions. The album spotlights the duo’s musical ecosystem with cameos from friends old and new, including Jackson Katz of Brutus VIII, Nick Rattigan of Current Joys, and Kelsea Feder of Blums. Mixed by Nate Amos (Water From Your Eyes and This is Lorelei) and mastered by Ruben Radlauer (Model/Actriz), the six-song collection breaks just past 19 minutes, but in that short span guides the listener through a frenetic freefall. The album, as its title suggests, careens between candid reflections on the real world and forays into the haze of daydreams—leaving the border open for exploration. “Is it magic or just mystery?” they ask rhetorically on the EP’s third track, Have a Nice Time Life, a nonsensical-by-design mediation on the danger and promise of getting addicted to the thrill.

fantasy is Al Nardo and Bailey Wollowitz, who collided in 2017 at the since-shuttered house venue Heck in Bushwick. Immediately bonding over the The Flaming Lips and Fullmetal Alchemist, the two have intermittently lived and worked together since, in Brooklyn and Los Angeles, but mostly on the road in-between, as shifting parts of pirate crews traversing the country and playing in bands Water From Your Eyes, This is Lorelei, among many more.

Their musical project began on these journeys, in moments stolen while wedged up between roommates and band members in overstuffed apartments and the cramped backseats of cars. The creative outlet of two working musicians, fantasy was first just Al and Bailey writing songs, using music to track the vicissitudes of their lives and relationships—with each other and the sprawling matrix of musicians of which they’re a part.

Bailey’s husky baritone whispers, shouts, and croons, Al’s airy vocals twang and soar transcendent, their voices drifting in and out of conversation with each other. A transient dialogue between the two runs through the tracks, often out of sync and existing sometimes in absentia. Chaos Practitioner’s meditative and surreal elements are grounded by driving percussion and shimmering twangs of harp, while ethereal synth layers maintain the dreamlike foundation. The final track, We Confront the Demon in Mysterious Ways, offers a tentative resolution to the struggle, between one’s inner life and the real world, laid out in the preceding tracks, with Al and Bailey recreating a never-ending argument between two lovers, at turns accusatory and defensive. “You wanted real love but you got me instead,” Al sings. “Does it feel good when you hurt me back?” replies Bailey.

Al and Bailey call Chaos Practitioner their “most bedroom collection to date.” It was crafted by close friends in close quarters, on the floors of hotel rooms and living room couches between Brooklyn, Mexico City, and Los Angeles. Though shaped by the surrealist endeavors of 70s prog-rock and late-90s dream pop, fantasy’s output is ultimately tethered to reality, to music as sculpted by years of live performance. A maximalist diatribe, their sound is guided by whatever the fuck they want, but always anchored by the emotional core of the central relationship.

Al says that Bailey is the gas. They’re steering, maybe (sometimes) pressing lightly on the brakes. Indulge in their fantasy, put out your cigarette and pack your bags, or don’t, and come along for the ride.