.

Photo credit: Michelle Pitiris

.

CLYPSO
announces new EP
LIGHTS OUT

DUE MAY 23 VIA ASTRAL PEOPLE RECORDINGS

+ Shares new single
‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’

.

.

Eora/Sydney-based vocalist, producer, songwriter and instrumentalist CLYPSO today turns the lights up on a new era with the announcement of her forthcoming new EP LIGHTS OUT, due for release May 23 via Astral People Recordings, also sharing latest single ‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’.

As she continues to move into her gritty and glitter-strewn new era, CLYPSO’s latest single arrives as an unabashed carnival of new beginnings, a celebratory shedding of the weights that no longer serve you. With bouncy, rubbery synths, brilliant, big room piano stabs, whiplash sfx and a thudding beat, ‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’ channels the clarity and euphoria of a new tomorrow with the heady and raucous highs of 90’s club music.

.

.

While her trademark sound – a technicolour collage of hyperactive beats, grimey basslines and digital synths – has always pulled from the sleazy aesthetics and messy dancefloors of late 2000’s indie electronica and new rave, it’s never proved more endearing or popular than currently. Practically bursting at the seams with character, ‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’ once again asserts her talent for weaving introspection into her propulsive and polychromatic dance-pop in a way that separates CLYPSO from the field.

Of ‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’, she shares: “‘I’VE SEEN THE LIGHT’ is the most cathartic song I’ve written. From the euphoric feeling I got while writing the repeated synth line, to the soulful lift I got tracking the housey piano bit before the big drop. My favourite lyric from the track is “Leave it all behind, new skin new tomorrow”, it really says it all and sums up where my head and heart are at.”

The announcement of CLYPSO’s new EP follows news of her signing to Astral People Recordings and the release of previous single ‘HOLLER’, her first new music since 2022’s ‘Pure Shores’. An adrenaline shot of vividly rendered indie electronica featuring additional production from Wave Racer, ‘HOLLER’ received wide-ranging DSP support, with adds to Spotify’s New Music Friday AU&NZ, New Dance Generation, Indie Arrivals, New Dance Beats, Fresh Finds AU&NZ playlists amongst others, alongside airplay across triple j, FBi Radio (Rotation), 2SER and more.

.

.

Since 2016, CLYPSO has established herself as one of Australia’s most exciting and respected names in indie music, releasing a string of collaborations and singles, including ‘D.Y.S. (Defend Your Situation)’, ‘Sidestep’, ‘Middle Ground’, ‘Storm’ and others. Releasing her debut EP, Cameo, in 2019, her resume is as extensive as it is enviable, having previously collaborated and worked with The Avalanches, Jamie XX, Neneh Cherry, Kwame, The Magician and more. Along the way, she’s amassed champions everywhere from triple j to MTV, NME, Stereogum, BBC Radio and further. Her thrilling live show has seen her land support slots for the likes of Channel Tres, Groove Armada, POND and PNAU, performing festival sets at Listen Out, Meredith Festival, Spilt Milk, Lost Paradise and Festival of the Sun.

Inspired by a real-life syncope episode, where the musician passed out and hit the pavement on Oxford St one rainy night, CLYPSO’s forthcoming LIGHTS OUT EP plumbs the equally terrifying and exhilarating emotions of dissociation. As she regained consciousness, everything came back to her in fragments: memories were splintered, images were scrambled and flashbacks tore through the present. Beneath concussion, smashed teeth and split lip, she demonstrates how losing consciousness can sometimes be the surest way to see things clearly.

LIGHTS OUT contains a similarly scattered logic: it’s a mosaic of ecstatic club songs, 80’s synthpop, sharp-witted electronica, distorted disco and sunny dancehall. The lyrics are biting, the samples theatrical and pounding, the energy convulsive and euphoric. It finds CLYPSOtransforming dark moments of pain and recovering into something frenzied and gleeful.

Opener ‘INTROspect’, inspired by the Japanese pottery art of Kitsungi, sweeps in with orchestral samples and mantra-like lyrics: “It gets worse before it gets better”. From there, lead single ‘HOLLER’ explodes out of headphones with hammering synths, restless, bric-a-brac percussion and chanting, pitched-shifted vocal samples urging her to “Slide the weak away”, touching on themes of silencing the critics both within and out.

LIGHTS OUT is as rich and varied stylistically as it is thematically. ‘POLAROIDS’ is about a childhood flashback she had while out cold on the pavement – she saw herself in the suburb where she grew up, racing through its streets on a bicycle – but this is balanced out with sparkling pop, filled with lush vocal layers and camouflaged harmonies. Closer and emancipation anthem ‘YOUR PART OF MY STORY IS OVER’ is an electrifying mix of bossa nova, tabla beats, horns, and barbershop quartet-inspired harmonies, while ‘ON AND OFF’ explores intimate, conflicted feelings through slinky club textures.

Like the Kitsungi that inspired ‘INTROspect’, CLYPSO’s LIGHTS OUT EP does not aim to obscure the previous ruin, but instead seeks to do the opposite – to highlight the breakage and transform it into an artistic flourish. Previously broken, CLYPSO has emerged stronger than ever and steps into a more hard-nosed, mature new chapter. With it, she has never sounded bolder or more self-assured.

.

LIGHTS OUT EP by CLYPSO
is out May 23 on Astral People Recordings
Pre-order now: HERE

.

Follow CLYPSO
Website – Instagram – Twitter/X – Spotify

.

.

AMNPLIFY – DB