Jen Meller – Queen City Sounds and Art

A Very Special Episode, photo courtesy the artists

A Very Special Episode has a name like a humorous reference to one of the worst episodes of a TV series with a heavy-handed theme but that wry nod to televised melodrama suits its own music that is swirling with a deeply atmospheric urgency. Or so it seems from the single “Heaven’s Gate,” whose lyrics seem to take the concept of cults, and that specifically named cult lead by Marshall Applewhite, and how they appeal to the emptiness and atomization of modern life. And how cults provide the kind of social and emotional support system that feels more authentic than a mere job or many family situations especially for people who are at an unstable and vulnerable point in their lives. In the horror film-esque music video directed by Jen Meller we see imagery that looks like it could be from the 1980s or 1990s with the lead character played by Gillian Leigh Visco working in an office on an old CRT screen as happened when you worked for a company that was operating off an older database system or even merely Oracle. This little details takes the setting out of time a bit because certainly misguided cults and cult-like behavior and manipulations have become part of American life in a more overt way. When Visco enters into the cult compound and engages with the lurid and bombastic new community lead by A Very Special Episode singer Kasey Heisler the video enters into Kenneth Anger territory of the darkly dreamlike. This richness of imagery and presentation is certainly not necessary but it helps to make a song that is already engulfing and brimming with heightened emotion and densely dynamic sounds even more memorable. A Very Special Episode is tapping into that realm of where shoegaze and post-punk meet akin to what one might expect from Ganser or The Prids and “Heaven’s Gate” is just a hint of what else awaits on the group’s new album Freak Me Out which releases on June 23, 2023 on digital and “blue light vinyl.” But for now watch the video for “Heaven’s Gate” on YouTube and connect with A Very Special Episode at the links below.