‘The Academy:’ Lutalo’s Grunge-Afflicted, Prosaic Indie-Folk-Rock Debut Album Out Today
PRAISE FOR Lutalo
“Superbly constructed songs ... delivered with a unique and laid-back voice.”
“The Academy draws inspirations from lo-fi, slacker guitar acts like Mac DeMarco and Palehound and The National-oriented indie rock, with an added dose of weirder, experimental post-punk and Big Thief-inspired folk.”
“A diverse and stirring set of songs suffused with an intriguing insight into modern America.”
“Indie's next coming is in safe hands ... this is what artistic evolutions should be.”
“Tastefully updated mid-2000s alt-rock, RIYL: Interpol, The Killers, Bloc Party, but all a bit toned down.”
“Fuzzed-out sharp edges reminiscent of TV On The Radio.”
“Nick Drake’s sense of chamber-folk simplicity.”
TRACKLIST
Summit Hill
Ganon
Ocean Swallows Him Whole
Broken Twin
Big Brother
Caster
3
Oh Well
About (Hall of Egress)
Haha Halo
Lightning Strike
The Bed
The Academy is out now, buy/stream it here.
Today, the 24-year-old Minnesota-raised, Vermont-based artist Lutalo (they / them) shares their debut album, The Academy. With an eye and a pen as precise as Fitzgerald’s, Lutalo vividly paints a highly personalized analysis of the ever-hopeful yet often alienating American Dream. The grunge tones and folk-like storytelling walk us through the spaces they’ve inhabited or orbited. See praise from FADER, CLASH, & Rolling Stone UK; you can catch it live throughout the US this fall as they hit the road with Nilüfer Yana, more info below. Listen to The Academy out now via Winspear, here.
Lutalo tells their stories with a modern folk voice a la Bob Dylan or King Krule, combed through with grunge guitar tones and a distinct deftness for melody and pace. Playing every instrument on The Academy, Lutalo crafts an album that serves as a potent backdrop to their literarily assembled character sketches and personal reckonings. Throughout, Lutalo’s exhibits an earnest and unsentimental curiosity about the world, dredging up empathy for anyone navigating their way through it.
Today’s Focus track “Ganon” reflects on the ever-present issue of gun violence in America. Lutalo explains, “‘Ganon’ is about my brother being a victim of a random shooting in St. Paul. Ganon is the main antagonist in one of my favorite game series The Legend of Zelda, he is a symbol of demise. I remember the night the shooting happened, I had a random intrusive thought about if my brother was killed and how much it’d affect me. I went to sleep and about 3am I woke up with an extremely uneasy feeling. I forced myself back to sleep and woke up the next morning to my sister calling me crying telling me what happened. It turned out that when I woke up in the middle of the night, that was the exact time it occurred. The goblin being Ganon, a goblin-like creature. The dragon being the gun.”
According to The Guardian, Lutalo’s got a gift for crafting “fuzzed-out sharp edges reminiscent of TV On The Radio;” The FADER describes lead single “Ocean Swallows Him Whole” as “a pleasing turn into a surly form of post-punk complete with chugging bass lines and a striking synth rattle,” while the newsletter Inbox Infinity calls the sound “tastefully updated mid-2000s alt-rock.”
Named after the St. Paul, MN school they attended on scholarship — the same school F. Scott Fitzgerald attended and famously dissected throughout his work — The Academy marks a period of re-invigoration and self-actualization for Lutalo. Diverging from the gentler sounds of last year’s AGAIN EP or their collab with bedroom pop phenom Claud on “Running” from earlier this year, The Academy is an altogether knottier and bloodier affair that traverses down fresh sonic avenues while maintaining Lutalo’s idiosyncratic voice. What results is a beguiling and visceral amalgam of rock, folk, post-punk, and soul paired with nuanced and humanizing observations on class disparity, privilege, and more informed by their time as an interloper into the elite world of The Academy.
Lutalo will be unveiling these new songs live on a series of UK festival dates before touring with Nilüfer Yanya in North America this fall. See all dates and info below.
LUTALO LIVE
^ w/ hippo campus
+ w/ Nilüfer Yanya
09/19/24 – Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue ^
09/28/24 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts +
09/30/24 – Washington, DC @ Black Cat +
10/01/24 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel +
10/02/24 – Boston, MA @ Royale +
10/04/24 – Montreal, QC @ La Tulipe +
10/05/24 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Theatre +
10/06/24 – Cleveland, OH @ Grog Shop +
10/07/24 – Chicago, IL @ Metro +
10/09/24 – Nashville, TN @ Basement East +
10/10/24 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle +
10/11/24 – Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West +
10/13/24 – Lawrence, KS @ Bottleneck +
10/15/24 – Denver, CO @ Meow Wolf +
10/16/24 – Salt Lake City, UT @ State Room +
10/18/24 – Vancouver, BC @ Hollywood Theatre +
10/19/24 – Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile +
10/20/24 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom +
10/22/24 – San Francisco, CA @ August Hall +
10/24/24 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda +
Keep in touch