100 Bands in 100 Days Presented by Verity Credit Union — Day 80: ITEM
Music fans of the Pacific Northwest, hello and welcome back to our third annual year-end daily countdown, 100 Bands in 100 Days, where every day until December 31st, we’re showcasing a new band or artist you have to know about, presented by Verity Credit Union. Follow the #100Bands100Days hashtag on Twitter to stay on top of all the bands featured and make sure to follow Verity on Twitter as well. Some days the featured act could be an established and locally-adored northwest-based musician that perhaps you haven’t been turned onto yet, and other times they could be a band with a small following that just hasn’t had their deserved time in the sun yet. Either way, we’re fairly confident you can come away from this daily segment with plenty of new favorites. Today’s musical offering is a band called ITEM that calls Seattle home.
With an ferociously energetic danceable beat, teamed with live instrumentation, ITEM is out to prove they do more than push buttons and twist knobs. With a fantastic self-titled debut EP under their belt, they’ll likely continue build steam as they head towards the next EP which is slated for a spring 2017 release. If it’s anything like this first one, it should do quite well. Songs like “Buried” from the EP seem to be made for the airwaves and while there’s no doubt it has a lot of dance elements, it is also a full-on indie rock burner.
From the band’s bio:
This is a duo of seemingly telepathic “indigo children” from the Pacific Northwest, who are creating a new breed of cinematic alternative music. Self-made, performing live as a guitar//synth and drummer live duo, they bring with them a coherent cloud of genre bending.
In early 2016, the soulful vocals and instrumentation from songwriter Evan Rendes were met with with the metronomic, breakbeat fervor from drummer and composer Quinton Sisson. Both music makers performed for roughly 10 years in various projects, even forming their own rock band together in 2014 before ITEM. Together as ITEM they have formed an atmosphere of blatantly honest, Sophisti-pop modernity.
The music itself places together a sonic experience of theatrical ambience, self-indulgent lyricism and fertile funk elements. The cake is iced with a futuristic sense of Hypnagogia, while live shows bring a sense of aesthetic minimalism- like an earnest post-modern reunion. ITEM themes explore the intangibility and emptiness of culture, vapor of living consciousness, while writing with self-exposing introspection. The reciprocated love of friends and fans of ITEM are the measure of the duo’s dreams.
They just want to share their heart. It’s like a super-secret diary that we’re all invited write a page in.
Their first release in July 2016 of their sybaritic single “Fine By Me” opened the flood gates to the six track release of the debut ITEM – EP in October. While touring down the coast for the EP release, ITEM received a wicked taste of Hollywood boulevard when laptops containing countless hours of new music were stolen. Now fully recovered, this duo has shown there is no inconvenience too large to undermine the birthing of something beautiful. With a second EP slated for spring of 2017, summer festivals, and movement towards a full-length album ITEM invites you to grow with them as they grow on you.
We’ll be keeping a close eye on this band to see what the future holds, because if they can follow up the debut EP with an equal output, they’ll be playing much bigger venues in no time at all.
(You can check out ITEM on Facebook and you can listen to them at Soundcloud and/or stream “ITEM” below)
Submissions for 100 Bands in 100 Days 2016 is now closed. If you’d like to see the whole list of bands we’ve featured, click HERE.
