Getting Grimier with Spooky Cool on “Heaven’s Sway”/“Time Will Tell” [Live Session Premiere]
“When we started, I think we wanted to maintain the allure of melodic pop while also trying frame it through a heavier, grimier lens,” Zac Hryciak of Richmond, VA psychedelic pop rock outfit Spooky Cool told Wormbrain when asked about the evolution of the group’s sound over the years.
The band is sharing a live session today recorded at the “The Hof” (or Hofheimer), a historic event space in their hometown, which demonstrates this release-to-release growth superbly. The recording, premiering today via W.W, lays out a stellar performance of one of their earliest tracks “Heaven’s Sway” and a wonderful taste at what they’ve still got loaded in the pipeline called “Time Will Tell.”
Spooky Cool are sharing their live session video today with W.W:
“‘Heaven’s Sway’ was written at the beginning of Spooky Cool and was released almost 4 years ago now. We've never had a live recording of that song which is why we wanted to perform it for this live session as kind of a final send off for the songs on that first EP,” Hryciak said, contrasting the respective conceptions of each song.
“Although I write all the material for this project, early on I would come into the space with a song and we would flesh it out together. I don't want to say jam, because we don't use that word — but, it bordered on jamming. ‘Time Will Tell’ was probably one of the last tracks we did that with.”
Spooky Cool dabbles across genres within a single song, slinking from inspiration to inspiration under a blanket of mind-expanding musicality. Their impossible to pinpoint sound makes an awful lot of sense when considering the singer-songwriter’s personal influences.
“I grew up on Paul Simon, The Beach Boys, Cat Stevens, etc.” they told Wormbrain. “But, by the time I was starting Spooky Cool, I was more heavily influenced by bands like Fuzz, Deerhoof and Ty Segall. So, it can be hard to pin down where the influences come from.”
Photo taken by Christian Nothing.
Following the now Spooky Cool classic “Heaven’s Sway,” which had originally been released on the band’s Every Thing Ever EP on Richmond’s very own Citrus City Records, comes the first offering from an impending full length, the yet-to-be-released “Time Will Tell.”
While word on the unheard LP remains elusive beyond this session video, Wormbrain was told that the new song, “is one of the few tracks on our upcoming LP which still has an aesthetic similar to our previous work. It feels a bit premature to speak on it, but the rest of the LP is kind of a hybrid between grimy pop rock and electronic pop songs, and the larger difference is how I was writing and removing limitations on what I could write and what instruments I could exploit. I was learning to use Ableton and writing as I was recording which allowed us to transition to a new sound and feel."
So, will you dive into Spooky Cool today? It’s nice here — you should.
Photo taken by Joey Wharton.
“I don’t want to say jam, because we don’t use that word — but, it bordered on jamming. ”
W.W: What is Wormbrain?
SC: Wormbrain is transcendental light bent through the void around the great frost giant's broken scabbard. It crawls up his undying facade. It kisses the titan's arm hairs. They stand on end in the silent, empty halls of eternity. He coughs and there is no echo. Wormbrain dope.
W.W: Thank you for sharing with Wormbrain.
Spooky Cool’s “Heaven’s Sway”/“Time Will Tell” live session is out now everywhere.
