A few weeks ago, Frankie Cosmos announced their fourth album with a brand new single and video, “Windows“. Described as “a manifestation of the band’s collaborative spirit”, the record was recorded at Brooklyn’s Figure 8 Studios and engineered and co-produced by Gabe Wax. They’re now back with a new song, “Rings (On A Tree)”, which initially appeared in Haunted Items, a digital-only collection of stripped-down songs for the piano that was released earlier this year. The track was re-recorded in a full band configuration for the album.

About the new single, Greta Kline detailed:

[su_quote][It’s] a fictional tale of a breakup from the point of view of a mistress. After I wrote it I realized what it meant to me– even though I’ve never been a mistress, I related to the character from being in a relationship where my feelings weren’t prioritized. I originally wrote it just on piano and released the solo version that way. The band version really takes it somewhere else and felt very collaborative. I love everyone’s parts. Alex wrote the funky guitar part I play in the middle section, based on an idea Luke and Lauren verbalized.[/su_quote]

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Frankie Cosmos will also be on tour very soon. Check their itinerary below:

Sep. 18 – Boston, MA – Royale

Sep. 19 – Burlington, VT – Arts Riot

Sep. 20 – Montreal, QC – L’Astral

Sep. 21 – Toronto, ON – Horseshoe Tavern

Sep. 22 – Detroit, MI – Deluxx Fluxx

Sep. 23 – Chicago, IL – Thalia Hall

Sep. 25 – Columbus, OH – Ace of Cups

Sep. 26 – Pittsburgh, PA – Spirit Hall

Sep. 27 – Washington, DC – Black Cat

Sep. 28 – Philadelphia, PA – PhilaMOCA

Sep. 29 – New York, NY – Webster Hall

Oct. 08 – Munich, DE – Heppel & Ettlich

Oct. 09 – Vienna, AT – Chelsea

Oct. 10 – Prague, CZ – Underdogs’

Oct. 11 – Cologne, DE – MTC

Oct. 12 – Luxembourg, LU – Rotondes

Oct. 13 – Amsterdam, NL – Bitterzoet

Oct. 14 – Paris, FR – Badaboum

Oct. 15 – Reims, FR – La Cartonnerie

Oct. 16 – Brighton, UK – The Haunt

Oct. 17 – Bristol, UK – Exchange

Oct. 19 – Leeds, UK – Belgrave Music Hall

Oct. 20 – Sheffield, UK – Delicious Clam (Sold Out)

Oct. 21 – Manchester, UK – Night & Day

Oct. 22 – London, UK – Islington Assembly Hall

Oct. 31 – Portland, OR – Wonder Ballroom

Nov. 01 – Tacoma, WA – Alma Mater

Nov. 02 – Vancouver, BC – Hollywood Theatre

Nov. 03 – Seattle, WA – Laser Dome @ Pacific Science Center

Nov. 07 – Denver, CO – Bluebird Theater

Nov. 08 – Denver, CO – Larimer Lounge

Nov. 10 – Tucson, AZ – Hotel Congress

Nov. 12 – Anaheim, CA – Chain Reaction

Nov. 13 – San Diego, CA – Che Cafe

Nov. 15 – Los Angeles, CA – 1720

Nov. 16 – Berkeley, CA – The UC Theatre

Frankie Cosmos are what we can call a prolific band. When we started this blog back in 2015, they had just released their debut album Zentropy. Since then, the New York band has already unveiled 4 full-length albums as well as a few EPs on the side. They indeed go faster than us: we still have only one blog. One year after Vessel and a few months after their Haunted Items singles collection, they have now announced a brand new record, Close It Quietly, and shared the lead single “Windows”. For this new project, the band, usually fronted by Greta Kline, will rely more on its other members as longtime bandmates Lauren Martin, Luke Pyenson, and Alex Bailey will contribute more.

Coming with an Eliza Doyle and Greta Kline-directed video, the lead single “Windows” is a song about self-improvement and forgiveness. As Kline explained:

[su_quote]This song takes place during the waiting period of healing, not knowing how to proceed or how to find the path to forgiveness. The inner versus the outer- learning to see yourself as part of the whole. For me the lyrics cover some of the slow movements of relationships, the shifts that occur in ways of thinking over time.[/su_quote]

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Earlier this year, Frankie Cosmos, the band headed by Greta Kline, shared their third album “Vessel“. Taken from this LP, here’s the Eliza Doyle-directed visuals for the track “Duet”. It features Kline who is looking for some company, trying to turn a CPR mannequin into a human being; it’s both sad and fun and perfectly fits the spirit of the track. Watch Frankie Cosmos‘ new video and check out their upcoming gigs dates below.

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Jul. 27 – Denver, CO – Underground Music Showcase

Jul. 28 – Denver, CO – Underground Music Showcase

Jul. 29 – Denver, CO – Underground Music Showcase

Aug. 17 – Paredes de Coura, PT – Vodafone Paredes de Coura

Aug. 19 – Brecon Beacons, UK – Green Man Festival

Aug. 21 – Belfast, UK – Voodoo Belfast !

Aug. 22 – Galway, IE – Roisin Dubh !

Aug. 23 – Dublin, IE – Button Factory !

Sep. 13 – Baltimore, MD – Ottobar *

Sep. 14 – Durham, NC – Motorco Music Hall *

Sep. 15 – Asheville, NC – Mothlight *

Sep. 16 – Atlanta, GA – Masquerade *

Sep. 17 – Birmingham, AL – Saturn Birmingham *

Sep. 19 – New Orleans, LA – Gasa Gasa *

Sep. 20 – Houston, TX – Satellite Bar *

Sep. 21 – San Antonio, TX – Paper Tiger *

Sep. 22 – Austin, TX – Barracuda *

Sep. 23 – Dallas, TX – Deep Ellum Art Company *

Sep. 24 – Oklahoma, OK – Tower Theater *

Sep. 26 – Minneapolis, MN – Fine Line Music Cafe *

Sep. 27 – Milwaukee, WI – Back Room @ Collectivo Coffee *

Sep. 29 – Champaign, IL – Pygmalion Festival

Sep. 30 – Detroit, MI – El Club *

Oct. 01 – Cleveland Heights, OH – Grog Shop *

Oct. 02 – Pittsburgh, PA – Cattivo *

Oct. 03 – Harrisburg, PA – Stage on Herr *

Oct. 05 – Jersey City, NJ – White Eagle Hall *

Oct. 06 – Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg *

Oct. 07 – New York City, NY – Bowery Ballroom *

Nov. 02 – Los Angeles, CA – The Regent Theater ^

Nov. 03 – Long Beach, CA – Tropicalia Festival ^

Nov. 05 – San Francisco, CA – The Fillmore ^

Nov. 08 – Portland, OR – Wonder Ballroom ^

Nov. 09 – Vancouver, BC – Biltmore Cabaret ^

Nov. 10 – Seattle, WA – Neptune Theatre ^

! w/ Squarehead

* w/ Lomelda & Stef Chura

^ w/ Kero Kero Bonito

Frankie Cosmos have shared their last album “Vessel” in March and there’s now a Tom Scharpling-directed (“The Best Show”) video to come with the highlight “Apathy.” In the visuals, a tough band named Frankie Cosmos is rehearsing before realizing the name is already used by another band and confronting them.

About the video, Frankie Cosmos‘ Greta Kline stated:

[su_quote]I am a huge fan of Tom Scharpling’s work and was so thrilled that we got to work together on this video. I trusted him entirely and just wanted to let Tom and his team do their thing. We had so much fun making it…I was laughing so much that it probably took much longer than it should have to shoot my parts.[/su_quote]

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Frankie Cosmos are in the middle of their US tour and will then come to Europe. Check their full itinerary below:

Apr. 30 – Pawtucket, RI – The Met !

May 01 – New Haven, CT – Toad’s Place !

May 02 – Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair *

May 03 – Burlington, VT – ArtsRiot *

May 04 – Montreal, QC – Theatre Fairmount *

May 05 – Toronto, ON – The Rec Room *

May 06 – Grand Rapids, MI – The Pyramid Scheme

May 07 – Chicago, IL – Lincoln Hall *

May 09 – Nashville, TN – The Basement East*

May 10 – Carrboro, NC – Cat’s Cradle (Back Room)*

May 11 – Richmond, VA – Capital Ale House*

May 12 – Washington, DC – Black Cat *

May 13 – Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer *

May 22 – Berlin, DE – Kantine am Berghain

May 23 – Hamburg, DE – Aalhaus

May 24 – Ghent, BE – DOKbox

May 25 – Amsterdam, NL – London Calling at Paradiso (Small Hall)

May 26 – Paris, France – Petit Bain

May 28 – Manchester, UK – Gorilla

May 29 – Glasgow, UK – The Art School

May 30 – Bristol, UK – The Fleece

May 31 – London, UK – Scala

Jun. 01 – Lille, France – Aeronef

Jun. 03 – Nantes, France – Stereolux

Jun .04 – Lyon, France – Grrrnd Zero

Jun .05 – Turin, Italy – Astoria

Jun. 08 – Queens, NY – Forest Hills Stadium **

Jul. 14 – Madrid, ES – Mad Cool Festival

Jul. 15 – Stirling UK – Doune The Rabbit Hole

Aug. 17 – Paredes De Coura, PT – Vodafone Paredes De Coura

Aug. 19 – Brecon Beacons, UK – Green Man Festival

* w/ La La La & Florist

** w/ Belle & Sebastian, Perfume Genius

! w/ Nadine

Much like (Sandy) Alex G or Car Seat Headrest, Frankie Cosmos’ Greta Kline began to gain a cult following long before she was signed to a major label. At age 20, she had already released dozens of albums under different monikers – according to the promo bio for “Vessel”, she’s done more than fifty now, and I certainly wouldn’t suggest clicking on her Bandcamp profile if you’re prone to feeling down over procrastinating. Greta Kline is notoriously famous for permeating every single aspect of her art with an endearingly twee charm that is nevertheless brimming with darker undertones. A picture of her dog wearing a green hat was turned into the album cover for the first Frankie Cosmos record, but it was hardly meant to be taken as a suggestion of light-hearted indie pop in the vein of, say, Best Coast – the album, whose closing track was titled “Sad”, was actually an eulogy for Kline’s pet.

Her album titles are also strong with the twee side (a few of my personal favourites include “sunshine over intertwined feelings”, “and it made me cry for a long time” and “i dont like crying and much ado about fucking”), but ever since she started to release music under her Frankie Cosmos moniker she has been keeping things relatively low-key: the band’s debut was simply titled “Zentropy”, and they went with the foolproof “adjective + noun” trope for 2016’s “Next Thing”. That’s not to say that she’s been cutting down on the tweeness, though – at its core, Kline’s music has pretty much remained the same equally wistful and catchy, guitar-heavy indie pop that she has been putting out since she was 15, and “Vessel” successfully follows that trend.

Frankie Cosmos’ major label debut mounts a strong case for Greta Kline as one of the most gifted indie pop songwriters of her generation

“Vessel” is Frankie Cosmos’ third studio album and the first one for the renowned Seattle label Sub Pop, which means that they’ve got a bigger production budget to work with. “Vessel” definitely sounds more professional than her past output, but it’s still an album that makes the most out of its rough edges. Kline’s music has always been informed by its DIY, lo-fi aesthetic, and that’s still very much present in “Vessel” – take “The End”, one of the strongest songs on the album, which is a demo recorded on Kline’s laptop left untouched for the final tracklist. There is definitely something to be said about the production in this album – it is noticeably slicker and sharper than in previous Frankie Cosmos releases, and there are certain bits that could have never made it in Kline’s Bandcamp output, but it manages to retain that sense of immediacy and confidentiality that made her a household name in the bedroom pop world in the first place.

Thoroughly informed by its anything-goes ethos, “Vessel” can feel like a 2018 version of “Alien Lanes” or “Bee Thousand” at points. Listen to songs like “As Often As I Can”, “My Phone” or “The End” and you’ll probably think they were written, played and recorded in the same take. Some of these songs don’t even qualify as songs in the traditional sense – the half a minute long “Ur Up” is comprised of a single verse and includes a false start with Kline fucking up the piano part and starting again. It’s a bummer that she didn’t take the time to develop it into a more fully fleshed out song, but that’s the kind of endearing allure that has turned outsider musicians like Daniel Johnston, Bob Pollard or The Space Lady into legends, and it’s not too much of a stretch to think that Kline will one day be mentioned among them.

There’s a spontaneous quality to Kline’s songwriting, as if she was making the songs up as she sang them. “Vessel” is basically an album made up of indie pop nursery rhymes with the occasional swear word thrown in here and there, yet it boasts certain proficient airs that hadn’t showed up in her work before. On paper, Kline’s songs are too brief to even try to change their course. Only the opening track “Caramelize” and the self-titled closer surpass the three minute mark, and more than half of these songs aren’t even two minutes long. Yet Kline’s songwriting has grown relatively complex and intricate for the genre’s standards – whereas her earlier work was almost a solo affaire, this time round she brought her songs to the rest of the band and they all fleshed them out together, which should provide a satisfying explanation for the Moog-lead instrumental breakdown on “Duet” or for the final sing-along on album highlight “Being Alive”, where every band member has a go at the song’s chorus.

At points, Kline’s lyrical straightforwardness can get too on-the-nose. Lines like “when the heart gets too tender / return it to the sender” or “being alive matters quite a bit / even when you feel like shit” are kinda cringeworthy on paper, but they take on a different character when sung by Kline, whose vocal delivery is as doe-eyed and charming as it can possibly get. It also helps that pretty much every song has a monster hook in it. The eighteen songs that comprise Vessel are essentially pills too hard to swallow gradually being glossed up to death until they slide down your throat – and when they finally do, it’s a glorious feeling. Certainly her strongest and most consistent album to date, Frankie Cosmos’ major label debut mounts a strong case for Greta Kline as one of the most gifted indie pop songwriters of her generation.