It's been several years since the release of 2016’s radio-smashing, Juno-nominated breakthrough 'Swooner' and The Zolas are ready to start a new cycle and a new direction with lead single 'Energy Czar' from their forthcoming album.
The British Columbia-bred band proves that you can take a step back to move forward.
'Energy Czar' the first single to be shared from the full-length, is a four-minute moment -
"where you’re allowed to feel all the fun narcissism and self-loathing that comes with being a human being in the 21st century".
On their forthcoming new album, Come Back to Life, the British Columbia-bred band proves that you can take a step back to move forward.
“We thought it was hilarious to make a Britpop record at a time when nobody but us is listening to that, but we have our little clique and that made us more excited to do what we want and say fuck it to how it might be received.”
The frontman describes Come Back to Life as a collision between the soundtracks for Danny Boyle’s culture jamming Trainspotting and Baz Luhrmann’s radical re- imagining of Romeo + Juliet. But for all the swaggeringly self-confident vocals and soaring wonderwall guitars on epics like “Yung Dicaprio” and “Miles Away”, The Zolas aimed for more than carbon copying a classic sound.
“There’s so many sounds we love that came out of the mid-90s UK; britpop and acid-house and trip-hop all carrying on in parallel scenes. If felt right to cross-pollinate this album with all of that,” Gray says. “So we’d write simple songs in our jam space and then steal sounds from the Prodigy or Primal Scream or the Happy Mondays or Tricky whenever it felt good.”
While Come Back to Life is an unrepentantly joyful sonic love letter to a magical time, The Zolas aren’t afraid to get serious on the lyrical side of things. It touches on everything from waking up to Canada's appalling treatment of its First Nations to global wealth disparity to artists being priced out of the cities they’ve helped make great.
With a brashness straight from the bucket-hatted heyday of Britpop, Gray says:
“I’m dead happy just being in this band right now. We love making noise together, we’re chasing the same vision, and lyrically I’ve never felt more on it. It’s nice to have a Kanye moment where you look at your output and go ‘This is the greatest shit that’s coming out this year.’ As cute Canadians we tend to shy away from feeling ourselves like that but it’s the truth.”
Listen to the track HERE
Instagram: @thezolas