Laveda - “bb”

Laveda is one of the most promising young shoegaze bands out there. Their debut record, What Happens After, was released in May of 2020, right in the midst of the pandemic, and its prescient apocalyptic themes and coinciding massive guitar-driven sound really resonated with genre obsessives. Fast forward to March of 2022 and the band is back with their first new tune since their impressive debut, “bb,” a song that sees the songwriting duo of Jake Brooks and Ali Genevich digging deeper into their bag sonic of tricks and pulling out something new and invigorating, while still building off their songwriting strengths.

While the songs on What Happens After generally conveyed a sense of fear and ambivalence at the world on both a micro and macro level, “bb” is unrestrained in its sentiments of frustration and anger. The song starts with a bleak, matter-of-fact realization, with Genevich singing “So, it’s over and our time has run out,” before exasperatingly giving it all up: “your memory’s burned. I want it burned. I wanna burn.” Brooks and Genevich pack some serious instrumental might to match these lyrical punches. Starting out with an ominous valley of muted strums, the duo then scales some massive peaks by upping the intensity, pairing crushing percussion with raging guitars at two distinct points. Genevich’s alluring voice serves as the bridge between them, steering the track to its conclusion. In a press release, she shared a bit about the track’s origins and inspiration:

In the winter of 2020, every day really started to feel the same for me. The pandemic seemed to be getting just as bad as when it began back in Spring and like everyone else all I had been thinking about was the possibility for life to feel normal again. For a while, I was just thankful that most of my friends and family were in good health and that we were able to keep ourselves afloat in such a crazy time, but of course, that’s not all I was feeling. Both Jake and I felt like the past year had been so wasted.

Stream “bb” below!

Laveda is currently in the midst of a month-long tour that includes a stop in New York City at Pianos on March 10th for the New Colossus Festival and dates in Austin, TX for South By Southwest. Tonight, they’re in Providence at AS220, and tomorrow they’ll be in New Brunswick, NJ (ask a punk for the address). For a full list of tour dates, check out the band’s website.

Check out Laveda’s music on Bandcamp and Spotify. Keep up with the band by following them on Instagram and liking them on Facebook.

To learn more about Laveda, check out our in-depth podcast interview with them from 2020 and read Zach Romano’s review of What Happens After.