DARKPLACE has unveiled their latest video/single, “Cars.” The track comes by way of the band’s impending debut album, About The End Of The World, set for release via Stockholm-based indie label Icons Creating Evil Art this Fall.
DARKPLACE is an anonymous band that has recently emerged on the music scene. Their music is rooted in post punk but incorporates elements of experimental rock, alternative, and a variety of other genres in their sound. The concept behind the album is centered around a grim future, or perhaps present, where the world is depicted through digital paintings in the accompanying music videos. The imagery is inspired by the bleak landscape of Stockholm’s Västerort, but with a unique and imaginative twist.
The band’s debut single “Arken Över Hesselby,” which translates to “The Ark Over Hesselby,” pointed towards an alternative version of the Stockholm suburb of Hässelby. Its video depicted a familiar cityscape, haunted by an unknown presence viewed form the sky. With “Fearmonger,” the story transports us to another part of the same daunting universe, to witness the fate of a lone foot soldier in the face of the mysterious Ark.
With the band’s latest single, “Cars,” the story moves on to a man travelling north, following cryptic messages written on highway signs that mysteriously only shows up in the blast of his headlights. Is he the only one that can see and follow the trail?
“Trying to escape this psychotic slow burning apocalypse is not easy. Nowhere is safe. These weird structures and phenomena seem to occur everywhere, all around the world. Nowhere is safe.”
Most of the instrumental songs on About The End Of The World were written with a specific dramaturgy and story in mind, which shows in the cinematic short movie-like music videos. DARKPLACE gives us an intriguing insight into their creative process. “The first idea for an animation was ‘Arken Över Hesselby.’ We started creating the art before we had the music, so the piece is written as a soundtrack to the animation.”
The art is a multi-layered process that involves photography, sculpting, oil painting, digital editing, and animation. DARKPLACE elaborates, “For structures, [the sculpting and painting mobile application] Nomad Sculpt is used to form it, then the motives are exported in the specific angle each scene requires and is imported into Procreate [a raster graphics editor app for digital painting] to be painted there. We use oil paintbrushes and paint over the photo. It is layers upon layers, and it gets messy. Exporting gets even messier since we want depth in the scenes and need to export them in layered depths. A few scenes in this project have been animated frame by frame as well. This project has taken almost two years so far, so we try to kept it to a minimal.”
Watch DARKPLACE’s “Cars” video at THIS LOCATION. Stream/purchase the track at THIS LOCATION.
Watch the previously released music video for first single “Arken Över Hesselby” HERE and “Fearmonger” HERE.
It comes as no surprise that DARKPLACE is about far more than just releasing excellent music. It’s an art project that seeks to explore and comment on the state of the world through audio and visuals. As a new and enigmatic force in the music industry, DARKPLACE is sure to turn heads with their innovative approach to creating art.
Icons Creating Evil Art will release DARKPLACE’s About The End Of The World full-length on vinyl LP and digitally in the Autumn months. Stand by for additional previews of the album, preorders, and more to post over the weeks ahead.
About The End Of The World Track Listing:
- Prelude
- Save Them All
- Fearmonger
- Cars
- Arken Över Hesselby
- This Is Loud
- Intermezzo
- Split
- No Escaping This
- The End
- Leben Hat Ein Ende
“Cars” single cover
About The End Of The World Cover
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