You may recall Piotr Fijalkowski as the frontman for UK shoegazers Adorable at the height of the genre’s initial peak in the early ’90s, though the artist has continued to release material following that project’s 1994 breakup—first with the short-lived post-Britpop outfit Polak a decade later, then under the solo outlet Pete Fij beginning a decade after that. Following a series of dreamy indie-pop experiments (with and without former Hounds of Love guitarist Terry Bickers), Fij returns at the end of the month with a debut solo record called Up’s the New Down, which once again hones in on the infectious melodies that were always perceptible under a bed of noise back in his Adorable days.
The project’s latest single “Wake Up Honey” is a repurposed B-side given new life with an 8-bit aesthetic and guitars beamed in from the era of Creation Records, creating a sense of nostalgia around a narrative that’s relatable to anyone who’s logged an embarrassing number of hours on Steam. “I’m guilty of getting lost in obsessions—I deliberately don’t play video games anymore, as I know I’ll find myself staying up ’til five in the morning playing Sim City or F1 in real time,” Fij shares. “I’ve figured that when I’m old and infirm and can’t get out I can lose myself for weeks playing video games, or watching all 86 episodes of The Sopranos back-to-back. I get that same obsession making music, or in creating artwork and videos. You can lose touch with the outside world, and we all sometimes need a nudge back to the here and now.”
As for the nostalgia factor—which he doubles-down on with a music video that cleverly echoes the song’s SNES aesthetic—he adds that he wasn’t intentionally looking to the past. “I’m not sure that my songs are overly nostalgic, though some of my songs have definitely leant on black-and-white cinematic tropes for visual springboards for the lyrics, and musically I’m always keen on a ’60s, John Barry–esque hook. In this song, when we were investigating an electronic aspect for the break, myself and my producer Julian Tardo stumbled on the ’80s 8-bit sound, and it immediately became apparent this was the way to go. It kind of cemented that the protagonist of the song was lost in a computer-game, blissfully unaware that his girlfriend has left him.”
Check out the animated video below, and pre-order Up’s the New Down here.
