“There’s elements of jazz and indie rock and hip-hip and electronic music, but ultimately, sunking is all about exploring the nooks and crannies between those genres, about throwing out all of the rules and expectations in search of something completely fresh and original,” says the band’s drummer Bobby Granfelt.
A duo comprised of Granfelt and keyboardist Antoine Martel, sunking are announcing their second album and first with ANTI- Records today. Titled ‘Smug,’ the groundwork for the album is drawn from a series of freewheeling, lo-fi drum sessions captured back in 2016 while the horn and keyboard-fueled arrangements on top are part of a more deliberate vision of the band’s sound that’s been evolving ever since the release of their 2019 self-titled debut.
Alongside today’s announce the band has shared two album tracks: ‘Bad Habits’ and ‘Glitch / Spy.’
Listen to both songs below.
Commitment is the name of the game for Granfelt and bandmate Antoine Martel, who first bonded over a shared love for progressive jazz, punk, shoegaze, and underground electronic music while still in high
school. Over the years, the powerhouse drummer and keyboard wizard would collaborate in a variety of
configurations — most notably as members of the sprawling Seattle collective High Pulp, which garnered a cult following and rave reviews on the strength of its “nuanced amalgam of funk, jazz-fusion, and R&B” (The Stranger) and “expansive, cinematic, intricately detailed sound” (KEXP)—but sunking always remained distinct from any of the pair’s other projects, in large part because it always remained just the two of them.
“There’s a bit more of a loose, shoot-from-the-hip approach we’re comfortable taking as a duo,” says
Granfelt. “I’ve always loved music that was rough around the edges—Alex G, Guided By Voices, Modest Mouse—and we don’t shy away from that kind of grit. We’ll just throw up a couple microphones and start recording anywhere: a studio, a bedroom, a moving vehicle, it doesn’t matter.”
“We have a bit of a telepathic thing going on where we don’t even need to speak to communicate at this
point, either” adds Martel. “With sunking, there are fewer filters between us and the music.”
1. Natural Monopoly (feat. Beanieskimask)
2. Good Intentions
3. Bad Habits
4. …Anxiety
5. Inheri[past]tense
6. Had A Few Religious Experiences, Forgot Them All (feat. Andy Morrill)
7. Uncle Kane
8. Salt Body (feat. Robthesoundbank)
9. Isles in the Sky (feat. Cyanide Haiku)
10. You Left Early
11. Glitch / Spy
12. 009 [Reno]
13. The Gun That Kills The Past (feat. Robthesoundbank)
14. Wormhole to Andromeda
15. Hakim Warrick
16. ESP
17. My Mind Is An Oven
18. Black Friday (feat. Greg Kramer)
19. Send More Chuck Berry
