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Photo – Hannah Hall

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“an emo-punk spin on propulsive heartland rock” – Brooklyn Vegan

Spanish Love Songs have a new single called Clean-Up Crew today – a mid-30s ode to life’s could-have-beens – the second track to debut from their highly anticipated new album No Joy out August 25, 2023 via Pure Noise Records.

“It feels like my entire life has been spent on the cusp of something,” says vocalist and guitarist Dylan Slocum. “I wanted to play baseball as a kid, and then I went to college and got hurt. I went to Hollywood to do film and TV and got pretty close. The band has gone beyond our wildest dreams, but at some point, you get tired of chasing after your dreams. The song is me taking a step back and asking, ‘Can we handle a small life? Could we give it up and move to the middle of nowhere and not worry about chasing some dream?’ To me, that’s death.”

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The new song follows the lead single Haunted, which was released last month with the announcement of No Joy. The track carries the saltwater-kissed vignetting of an Asbury Park summer, awash in Boss-inspired nostalgia and percussive acoustic guitar that build to some of the band’s biggest hooks yet. The video, directed by Hannah Hall, is a quirky view into a bar-band scene where everyone’s just looking for a good time.

Stream Clean-Up Crew here

Brimming with new wave pastiche, fluttering synths, shimmering walls of chorus guitar, and four-on-the-floor rhythms, No Joy isn’t an exclamation point follow-up to the emotional catharsis of the landmark Brave Faces Everyone as much as it is an exhale – the sound of vocalist and guitarist Dylan Slocum, his wife and keyboardist Meredith Van Woert, guitarist Kyle McAulay, bassist Trevor Dietrich, and drummer Ruben Duarte finding peace in quieter moments and embracing the negative space.

“This is the closest we’ve ever gotten to figuring out how to translate what I hear in my head with more clarity,” Slocum says.

Produced by the band and Collin Pastore (Lucy Dacus, Julien Baker, Illuminati Hotties) and mixed by Carlos de la Garza (Paramore, M83, Best Coast), the 12 songs on No Joy continue to find Spanish Love Songs grappling with the messiness of what it means to be alive in the modern age – unsure of the answers themselves but confident that together, we can all come a little closer to the solutions.

If Brave Faces Everyone was about mustering up the strength to barely break even in an increasingly bleak world, No Joy is finding the internal peace required to stay in the black. As Slocum says, “it’s an album about finding happiness in what you have and your current moment. It might be your best moment, or it might not, but you have to find joy in it.”

Spanish Love Songs recently performed to sold out crowds in select markets in the US and UK, and at Slam Dunk Festival in May. The band have also just announced their first-ever Australia tour culminating in Melbourne on No Joy’s release date.

No Joy is out August 25 via Pure Noise Records.

Pre-order No Joy here

Watch the music video for Haunted here

Stream Haunted on digital platforms here

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SPANISH LOVE SONGS
AUSTRALIAN TOUR
Tour Dates:

SATURDAY 19 AUGUST – THE SHAKING HAND, CANBERRA
SUNDAY 20 AUGUST – SIN OR SWIM HARBOUR CRUISE, SYDNEY
MONDAY 21 AUGUST – HAMILTON STATION HOTEL, NEWCASTLE
WEDNESDAY 23 AUGUST – VINNIES DIVE BAR, GOLD COAST
THURSDAY 24 AUGUST – BAD LUCK, BRISBANE
FRIDAY 25 AUGUST – STAY GOLD, MELBOURNE

Tickets from HERE

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About SPANISH LOVE SONGS:

Since 2013, the LA-formed indie-punk quintet Spanish Love Songs have made hay on the backs of a string of beloved albums – 2015’s Giant Sings The Blues, 2018’s Schmaltz and 2020’s Brave Faces Everyone – lauded by critics and fans alike for their richly personal, no- holds-barred lyricism awash in existential dread, hyper-personal cultural ruminations and attempts to answer life’s big questions.

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AMNPLIFY – DB