Gus Englehorn – Queen City Sounds and Art

Queen City Sounds Podcast Ep. 30: Gus Englehorn

Gus Englehorn is a songwriter who now resides in Quebec City, Canada. He grew up in Alaska and Hawaii with parents whose lifestyle meant jobs in both states and as a youth got into snowboarding and turned it into a career. During that stretch of his life Englehorn became exposed to genuine underground and otherwise non-mainstream music partly through skateboarding and snowboarding videos which often showcase cutting edge artists. Though Englehorn didn’t fully grow up playing music he started picking up guitar toward the end of his tenure as a professional snowboarder and he realized at one point that he couldn’t spend the rest of his life in such a physically demanding sport and around a decade ago he started to make the transition into more creative endeavors. While many people who come to music later in life than usual often latch on to a musical style of their younger years or something more trendy at that time. Englehorn instead leaned into his creative instincts and personality and has produced a body of work striking for its uniqueness and creativity. The songwriter’s first album Death & Transfiguration released in January 2020 right before the still ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, possibly the worst time to release and promote a new album in recent memory. The record nevertheless had the hallmarks of what has made Englehorn’s music stand out. Though it could be considered a truly idiosyncratic indie pop that fans of Half Japanese and Daniel Johnston might appreciate, Englehorn is clearly tapping into some musical ideas of the 90s but stripped back the sonic excess to allow the songs to hit with a charming vulnerability in its unusual character studies and stories that should form the basis of a future, more benevolent Harmony Korine film.

With that first album and its 2022 follow up, Dungeon Master, Englehorn has performed the music with his partner in life and drummer Estée Preda who also does the artwork for both records. Her visual style akin to children’s mythical storybooks and manga both is a perfect analog of the music within. Dungeon Master finds the duo exploring the inclusion of synths and an even more surreal sensibility in the lyrics and blending of musical elements. The album sounds like a great collection of stories you’d want to see as a Jim Jarmusch anthology film. Fortunately music videos for “Exercise Your Demons” and “Tarantula” at a minimum exist and both reveal even more layers of the wonderful yet highly accessible weirdness of this album. We had a chance to speak with the charming and engaging Englehorn about his life and his art and with any luck we’ll see a more extensive set of live shows in the near future. Apologies for not getting this posted in time to let people know about Estée Preda’s art show in May 2022.

Listen to the interview below on Bandcamp and to get a copy of Dungeon Master or Death & Transfiguration digitally you can visit the artist’s own Bandcamp and for the physical media (cassette/CD/vinyl) you can visit Secret City Records.

Gus Englehorn Chuckles at His Own Youthful Naivete on the Gloriously Strange “Exercise Your Demons”

Gus Englehorn appears as a charismatic Christian minister in the video for “Exercise Your Demons” in full sales/charlatan mode, suit, headset mic and all. But this far too convincing strangeness goes into an exercise video like you’d see on late night TV but this one blurring the metaphor of exorcism and exercise as in to bring forth one’s demons and let them fly out for a change instead of holding them in or trying to expunge them from the psyche. This all set to a propulsive guitar jangle pop song and Englehorn’s always bizarrely fun and unique vocals. When Englehorn repeats mantra-like the lines “young and dumb,” “for years to come” and “I was so dumb” you recognize that truth and regret for yourself. The combination of spoken word and singing on the tracks from the singer-songwriter’s forthcoming album Dungeon Master (due out April 29, 2022 on Secret City Records, pre-order here) combined with eerie yet cheerful synths and unexpectedly solid pop songcraft including this track promise one of the standout albums of 2022 in terms of originality and making odd yet incredibly relatable ideas accessible through a cultural insight that only coming at subjects from an idiosyncratic angle and yield.

Gus Englehorn on Facebook

Gus Englehorn on Twitter

Gus Englehorn on Instagram

gusenglehorn.com

Join Gus Englehorn in the Weird Side of Your Brain on the Dada Pop “Tarantula”

The surreal weirdness of Gus Englehorn’s song and video for “Tarantula” immediately triggers memories and visions of Half Japanese, Alice Donut, They Might Be Giants and King Missile in your brain. It’s from an album called Dungeon Master and if geek adept status wasn’t earned for Englehorn for that alone, the curiously catchy and tuneful song turns an off standard melody sound in the vocals and unusual delivery into something that draws you in. The lyrics are also somewhat nonsensical and bizarre. “Tarantula that whispers in your ear” followed by lines that don’t clarify a thing like “Hold your head under water” and “River bed ever after.” But it doesn’t matter. It’s absurdist imagery at its finest and need not fulfill some linear succession of thought. The image of a tarantula whispering quasi mystical, Dada-esque phrases into your ear forces the brain down alternate pathways that take you off the map of the everyday. And does it make less sense then the words to a whole swath of pop music? “Louie Louie” people have sung along to since it came out or “Surfin’ Bird” and both songs are completely demented musically with lyrics that matter less than the almost shamanistic quality of their cadence and the same is true here. Watch the video that Englehorn made with his musical partner in crime Estée Preda made for “Tarantula” on YouTube and connect with Englehorn at the links below. Dungeon Master releases on April 29, 2022 on Secret City Records.