Los Colognes Premieres New Album 'The Wave' with Culture Collide

Los Colognes is on the road now, and will play New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Nashville, and Seattle, as well as Sasquatch and Lockn' Festivals. So far, The Wave has been praised by Stereogum, Relix, Observer, Consequence of Sound, American Songwriter, and more.

One of the highest and rarest aspirations in popular music is to reach for the transcendental, to access the spirit. On The Wave, Los Colognes succeeds at this - in breaking through the con?nes of everyday pop song lyricism to tell a holistic story. It's not a concept piece, but it's a brooding and joyful song cycle ?lled with philosophical rumination, effortless hooks, inspiring musicianship, and expansive arrangements. It's an album perfectly suited of the current zeitgeist of unease and hope.

Stereogum announced the album in January with a premiere of "Flying Apart." Guitarist/singer Jay Rutherford opines in the song - "Nobody believed / We're all just hoping / Floating down streams." It's a song that invokes "the wave" metaphor of the album's title, while churning through its own sonic sea of shimmering keyboards and guitars anchored by drummer Aaron Mortenson. The music evokes any of the best moments of late seventies or mid eighties FM radio while never being weighed down by the specter of in?uence. Los Colognes are a young band who have managed to forge their own sound while channeling the best sonic worlds of the decades past. Though The Wave is firmly planted in a retro pop/rock sound, the band has some deep Americana roots, and has backed up artists like Margo Price, Rayland Baxter, Caitlin Rose, Nikki Lane, Jonny Fritz, Andrew Combs, Erin Rae and more.

Unlike the live approach used to record the group's previous records, The Wave was built from the ground up with attention to each part. There is a certain economy of space in the songs that feels deliberate, while never ceasing to be warm and inclusive. Guitar and keyboard lines drift off each other in between lyrical exchanges while Mortenson propels the beat, sometimes meditative, sometimes driving.
The journey to ?nish recording The Wave was its own quest for Rutherford and Mortenson, a more deliberate process of creation and craft that shows a band becoming fully aware of its voice and its vision. Los Colognes have given us a singular collection of quietly anthemic tunes held together by philosophical re?ection and damn ?ne rock and roll chops. The Wave is coming.

The Wave is out May 12th, preorder the album HERE.

Read the full bio by William Tyler HERE.