[Cover photo credit to Bella Petro]
Portland, Oregon-based Post-Punk band Forty Feet Tall features Cole Gann on vocals/guitar, Jack Sehres on guitar, Brett Marquette on bass/backup vocals, and Ian Kelley on drums. They are gearing up to release their new single video for “Isochronism” this Friday on July 19th, 2024. For the single “Isochronism”, the band worked with local producer Cameron Spies (Spoon Benders, The Shivas).
In celebration of the new single and video, they will be co-headlining a show at Mission Theatre on July 19th also, along with Family Worship Center and Black Shelton as support. As for their upcoming plans, they’ll be releasing several singles over the coming months and are aiming to release their next LP in early 2025.
We are delighted to premier the song and video for “Isochronism” here on Wildfire Music + News today.
The track is an intricate blend of heavy and melodic elements that alternates between the sinister and energetic as the lyrics take on the idea of cycles and recurrent, maybe even inescapable realities. But there’s also a dramatic sense of resistance towards these elements, maybe even a challenge sent in their direction. It suggests forces beyond our control as human beings and the choices we make when confronted with those gravitational pulls. Sonic repetition plays into that feeling in the song, which is as chiming and trippy as it is mysterious. It’s refreshing how widely Forty Feet Tall casts their net in terms of sonic traditions, at times sounding like Psych Rock or Electronica without ever losing a heavy undertow.
The video for “Isochronism” is whole other kettle of fish that plays into some of the feelings and ideas mentioned above, but takes them to another level. Explicitly creating “doubles” of the band members, creepy and enigmatic with their bulbuous heads and drawn-on faces, the video juxtaposes elements from ordinary life with the suggestion that this other reality is always waiting to break through and cause disruption. There’s a casual feeling to the band members’ normal interactions, like seeing a deer in the headlights, making the viewer want to warn them of impending strangeness when realities collide. This matches the “sinister and energetic” feeling of the song very well and also leaves the viewer wondering which is the real band. Maybe the ones we see in so called “real” life are the dopplegangers after all. Would we know the difference?
The band were heavily involved in making the video and it suggests their sense of humor, their curiosity, and their determined DIY ethic.
The band says about the single:
Isochronism is a physics term to describe how a pendulum takes the same time to complete a swing, no matter where the starting point. The song is generally about the circular nature of life, the passage of time, day and night and the term felt like it captured those ideas well.
They add about writing and recording the new single:
The song grew from us improvising together at a rehearsal – how most of our ideas are born. We’d been listening to some heavier, psych-ier music at the time, and really wanted to create something that felt massive, yet subtle and melodic. The lyrics came last, as they almost always do and Cole made the finishing touches as we stepped into the studio. We recorded at Charles Glade’s incredible home studio, Magnetic Impressions, and then got to mix and master it with our long-time collaborator, Cameron Spies, at Trash Treasury Recording.
The companion music video is “a fever dream inspired by the movie Frank, the weirdest parts of Twin Peaks, and the feeling of being watched…”. It was directed by bassist Brett Marquette and shot by Cooper Davis.
They add about making the music video:
Brett was the mastermind and director behind this thing and was able to get it done in an insane amount of time. It’s a fever dream inspired by the movie Frank, the weirdest parts of Twin Peaks, and the feeling of being watched… A big thank you to our friend, Cooper Davis as well. We were insanely busy with a ton of other band rabbit holes and he came up for the weekend and shot the whole thing. It would’ve been a nightmare if he hadn’t come in with a camera, a smile, and a lot of wine.
