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Apr 13, 2021 By Caleb Campbelll Photography by Lasse Dearman

Danish band Communions were still in high school when they released their 2014 debut EP Cobblestones. In the intervening seven years, the band have followed with another EP, a 2017 full-length record, and most recently, their 2019 EP Flesh and Gore, Dream and Vapor. Now the band have entered a new phase in their career, newly signed to Tambourhinoceros with a fresh lineup focused around brothers Mads and Martin Rehof, and a sophomore LP, Pure Fabrication. The band have already shared “Cupid,” “Splendour,” and “Birds of Passage” from the record and are now back with another album track, “Learn To Pray,” premiering with Under the Radar.

Though upon debut Communions might have drawn more comparisons to fellow Danish post punks Iceage, “Learn To Pray” shows a restrained, textured side to the band, instead focusing on Martin Rehof’s lyrics of decadent decline. Rehof reflects on a society falling at the hands of narcissism and fame. Rehoff sees his dystopian surroundings as a parade of fools, proudly marching to destruction at their own hands — Like jesters on a tightrope/We stride to our disasters/On unedifying highways/We reap the whirlwind.”

Amidst it all, Rehoff’s icy delivery sports a barely concealed sinister element, all while never blunting the band’s talent for exceedingly catchy melody. The combination works wonders, proving Communions capable of going in exciting new directions while retaining the effortlessly cool indie rock style that they’ve forged over the years together.

Martin Rehoff says of the track, “While some of the opening songs of Pure Fabrication deal with change, independence, and liberation — forces that allow one to fabricate one’s own destiny — Learn To Pray leans into the middle of the record, and hones in on an opposing theme; being anchored to the fabric of a social world. In a tragic and satirical tone, it tells a little story of a communal fall from grace in the midst of cultural decline. The song paints a somewhat dystopian picture, describing a world where preying and praying are two sides of the same coin; It’s just as much about the wheels set in motion that cause one to prey on one’s surroundings, as it’s about the mechanisms that lead one to pray, perhaps futilely, for a more utopian future.” Check out the song below and watch for Pure Fabrication, due out on April 23 on Tambourhinoceros.