When I saw Froth on stage July 7th at the Atrium, something about their synth-surf-pop-rock grooved me. They are a familiar reminder of back home, cruising around in a car with your friends and enjoying the So-Cal sun, with hymned ears.
Froth was a band that began as a joke. The story is legend, and has circulated in all their interviews. The band has been picked up by famous designer and creative director of Yves Saint Laurent Hedi Slimane. Froth has entered the world of 'who you know' and what you 'do' with that. I really think their rise is going to keep frothing (yes, I did it). Their creativity is really blossoming and booming at the seams. It's something especially noticed in their latest work. Their visual style shy's away from the image of classic cali boy surf, and their sound morphs into a more experimental hue of melodies. (Cue more risks)!
Check out what I mean in their latest in music video - “Contact” inspired by writers Haruki Murakami and Richard Brautigan. It has key elements shaped by producer Thomas Dolas brought to life with visuals. And better yet, check out the inspiration behind it as provided by vocalist Joo-Joo Ashworth himself below.
Written & Directed by Riley Blakeway Shot on Kodak 16mm film Art Direction and Makeup : Halle Saxon Gaines Starring Jason Murphy and Christa Taken from the forthcoming album, Outside (briefly) produced by Tomas Dolas out on 10th February on Wichita Recordings. Pre-order now on limited edition yellow vinyl, CD and download.
https://froth.bandcamp.com/
UPCOMING SHOWS
November
11 - Western Cape, S.Africa Psych Night Festival
17 - Eindhoven, Holland Come As You Are Festival @ Stroomhuis
18 - Brussels, Belgium Le Trone
19 - Paris, France New Noise Night @ Trabendo
20 - Middelburg, Holland De Spot
21 - London, UK Moth Club
23 - Amsterdam,Holland 2 year Black Rice Anniversary/Subbaculture present @ OT301
Check out these questions answered by vocalist Joo-Joo Ashworth via email.
1. Joo-Joo, you’ve mentioned Haruki Murakami in recent interviews on Outside (Briefly) as inspiration for the lyrics. Can you give me insight on what it is about Murakami that resonates with you?
I've always loved how he writes with a kind of peaceful scenic style but turns it around and uses bizarre changes while still maintaining that style. Beyond that he's just really relatable and everyone in the band has become a big fan of his.
2. “Contact” cuts between a lone man obsessing over outer space. I also see that connection is also a key concept. Can you tell me what the young woman in the video represents? Is she also looking for connection?
The woman in the video sort of represents the intangible thing that people cling onto in hopes to make sense of everything. Religion, Politics, Spirituality, Aliens, Love etc. It was kind of an open ended idea but I'm glad that you noticed haha.
3. According to your bandcamp, Outside (briefly) was worked on in late 2015, and recorded this year. In that amount of time, I imagine the composition may have changed slightly, if so can you tell me a bit about the process of change?
Yeah a lot of the songs had been around since we were touring on our prior album. Contact was the first single and was changed up a few times playing live but never really felt totally right, but having so many options in the studio helped fill in some of the gaps that we were running into. A similar thing happened with Sensitive girl and for both songs the live instrumentation is still a little different.
4. Your music videos feature key pockets of Los Angeles especially around Lincoln Heights, Chinatown, Hollywood, and Echo Park. Are these areas special to you? If so, why?
Definitely. We all live in Los Angeles and the locations in the video are all places that are in our lives. Cameron worked at the pizza spot in the Nothing Baby video and the Contact video was largely shot at and around my house in Lincoln Heights. A lot of parts of the videos are based around the locations and we worked with what was already there.
5. I wanted to call attention to the differences of backdrop in “Nothing Baby” to “Contact”. In “Nothing Baby”, LA can be easily identified as the backdrop in Cameron’s life. In “Contact” I feel there’s less of a familiarity with the city. (Awesome you filmed in Lincoln Heights by the way!). Can you tell me a little bit of the process you and Riley Blakeway went through for this vision? Were the differences in setting discussed?
The Nothing Baby video was definitely supposed to be more about what it was like for Cameron living in Los Angeles at that time, so it was important that it was easily identifiable but Contact was more based around the relationship between the space obsessed man and the enigmatic woman, so the use of Los Angeles as the setting for the video was mostly out of convenience.