Cara Potiker – Queen City Sounds and Art

“Hailey Moon” is moondaddy’s Lush and Vulnerable Dream Pop Song of Overcoming Personal Trauma

There’s something deeply mysterious about the way Cara Potiker arranges the layers of evocative atmospheres across her new album Poet Lies. Take for example the lead single “Hailey Moon.” Without overtly hazy elements the synths flow effortlessly together to enshroud her sultry vocals in a dreamlike resonance. Slowly rising and falling drones and sparkling synth blossoming and fading over a steady beat that never seems to direct the pace but marks the time. All while Potiker seems to sing about tentatively opening up to someone in spite of one’s own flaws and weaknesses that one has had to harbor from other people for an extended period of time and how even exposing these things to anyone outside of your own head can be perilous because many if not most people lack the sensitivity and grace to respect vulnerability and trauma in a productive manner. But in this song Potiker appears to acknowledge that those “scars” and fears that one might think one has hidden from other people can be challenging or impossible to completely conceal and that maybe it might be better to operate knowing that to be the case and accept the possibility and perhaps inevitability of being hurt and even to be understood but that taking that risk might be the first step in getting to a place of greater personal strength. The gorgeous and cool luminosity of the composition of this song places it in the realm of shoegaze and dream pop but also emotionally in those psychic spaces that Julee Cruise expressed so well in her own dark pop confections of regret, resignation, despair and hope. Listen to “Hailey Moon” on YouTube and follow moondaddy at the links below. Poet Lies released via Volar Records on August 18, 2023.

moondaddy on Instagram

moondaddy’s “Silver Dust” is a Gorgeously Orchestral, Introspective Synth Pop Song Swimming in Feelings of a Cinematic Romance

The minor chord shift at the beginning of moondaddy’s “Silver Dust” immediately puts you an introspective mood enhanced by its slow resolving guitar riff and lushly luminous and hazy production. At times it’s reminiscent of Avalon-period Roxy Music in its evoking of another era like the musical equivalent of the mood of Suddenly Last Summer as interpreted by the song by The Motels or a pastoral Terrence Malick-directed romantic noir that never happened. Cara Potiker’s enigmatic and crooning vocals floating in glittery guitar and humming keyboard sounds with ethereal synth accents create the kind of mood you want to spend some time indulging for the duration of the song but it will linger long after. The synth melody mid-song when the wash of guitar and keyboards clears is a striking moment that leads to a gorgeous processional resolve that brings together the rich sonic palette the band has employed throughout for a truly satisfying resolve. Listen to “Silver Dust” on Spotify and follow moondaddy at the links below.

moondaddy on Instagram

“Lover’s Eye” by moondaddy is a Gorgeously Gloomy Ride Through One’s Past and on Into Pursuing the Life One Wants

“Lover’s Eye” by moondaddy exudes a weariness with being held back by the past and memories of a time one has outgrown and from which one has already moved on in fact even if those ties linger in the heart. Its moody tones and downward progressions convey a heartsick melancholy that comes from being hit by memories that have such emotional weight you’re forced to reckon with them right there and then. Its blooms of sharp guitar and slow, swirling rhythm feels like being caught in a spiral of reverie but as the song goes on the spectral keyboard melody and shift from dark melodic rock to something that feels more electronic has the effect of leaving that time behind having reconciled with what you can’t go back to and what made aspects of it seem special and magical like the line “You were my kaleidoscope, beautifying my dreams” and its suggestions of someone who had the ability to allow you to influence your aspirations but also to follow them. Cara Potiker’s unique vocals are the perfect vehicle for this insightful and poetic set of words both self-aware and capable of uncovering old pains to move past them. Listen to “Lover’s Eye” on YouTube and follow moondaddy at the links provided.

moondaddy on Instagram