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Jun 27, 2018 Trevor Powers By Christopher Roberts

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Youth Lagoon was essentially a solo project for Trevor Powers (even though he did tour with a live backing band), but back in 2016 he retired the project, broke up the one-man band. Powers is releasing his first album under his given name, Mulberry Violence, on August 17 via his own label Baby Halo. He’s already shared three songs from it: “Playwright” (via a video for the song), “Ache” (which was one of our Songs of the Week), and “Plaster Saint.” Now he has shared two more songs from the album, “XTQ Idol” and “Dicegame,” which are the first two tracks from the album. Listen to them below.

Powers had this to say about “XTQ Idol” in an interview with The Fader: “Early in the process of forming Mulberry Violence, I took a trip to the Czech Republic and visited Sedlec Ossuary, a small Roman Catholic church elaborately adorned with the bones of 40,000 people - many of whom died from the plague. Garlands of skulls. Crosses of femurs. Chalices of hipbones. A chandelier made from every bone in the human skeleton. This was all constructed as a way to honor the dead. For me, it was a labyrinth of mirrors. My reflection multiplied thousands of times in front of me, and I couldn’t look away. I saw myself as I really was. Trembling, I said a hushed prayer. Each turn showed me there was no escape from how it all ends; beneath this skin & without this spirit was just another heap of bones. As the tension through my muscles eventually lessened, a peculiar peace washed over me. My problems shrunk. My stress diminished. My pain was temporary. Maybe one day someone will use my tibia in a human chandelier? I can only dream. Late that night, I started ‘XTQ Idol.’”

He had this to say about “Dicegame”: “My favorite painter, the existential outcast Francis Bacon, described a work by saying, ‘It was like one continuous accident mounting on top of another.’ This is entirely how I function - shaping ideas for weeks or months that lead absolutely nowhere. It’s not until I fuck up and do something totally inadvertent that the path finally begins to glow. The mistake is always more captivating than the intention. ‘Dicegame’ had six other versions before it. All of them different; none of them honest. The entryway refused to accept any of my passcodes; it wasn’t until the big blunder came and I typed that into the keypad that the gate finally swung open. I chased the accident, mutated it, made more mistakes along the way, viscerally put them together, and the song finally had life.”

As Youth Lagoon, Powers released three albums: 2011’s The Year of Hibernation, 2013’s Wondrous Bughouse, and 2015’s Savage Hills Ballroom.

Trevor Powers Tour Dates:

9/26 Boise, ID Neurolux
9/27 Seattle, WA Barboza
9/28 Vancouver, BC Biltmore
9/29 Portland, OR Mississippi Studios
10/1 San Francisco, CA Independent
10/3 Los Angeles, CA Lodge Room
10/5 Salt Lake City, UT Metro
10/6 Denver, CO Lost Lake
10/8 Kansas City, MO Encore
10/9 Omaha, NE The Slowdown
10/11 Minneapolis, MN Turf Club
10/12 Chicago, IL Empty Bottle
10/13 Detroit, MI DIME
10/14 Toronto, ON Horseshoe Tavern
10/16 Boston, MA Great Scott
10/17 New York, NY National Sawdust
10/18 Philadelphia, PA Boot and Saddle
10/19 Washington, DC U Street Music Hall
10/30 London, UK Electrowerkz
11/1 Amsterdam, NL Cinetol
11/3 Hamburg, DE Häkken
11/4 Berlin, DE Frannz Club

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