A couple of weeks ago, Lou Barlow released the followup to last year’s Brace the Wave: Apocalypse Fetish, a five-song EP recorded on a down-tuned ukulele. This year, Barlow said in a release, is “the year that conspiracy theorists became experts and anger went even more mainstream.” The title track suggests that those for whom the end of the world is an ongoing fixation have gotten a little tired of waiting for the cosmic shoe to drop, and have thus taken matters into their own hands. And Barlow wrote all of this before Donald Trump had even been elected—Apocalypse Fetish came out October 28, and the world has yet to inch away from the brink.
But with this most terrible of years finally, mercifully, running out the clock, the Dinosaur Jr. bassist is getting his licks in while he can. This morning, we’re premiering the video for Apocalypse Fetish’s “The Breeze,” a song that’s certainly less political than the title track, but the wide-open thuds of those open detuned strings and the gentle exhaustion of the melodic line—not to mention Barlow’s blinded expression as he allows the fate of the chorus to settle in—feel like the fruits of a private life that’s been given a beaten by the political.
Check out the clip for “The Breeze” below.
Apocalypse Fetish is out now via Joyful Noise. You can pick up a copy here.
