Under her new solo music project, Julia, Julia, musician Julia Kugel (of The Coathangers and Soft Palms) releases her debut single “Fever in My Heart,” a cryptic, atmospheric tune about feeling completely ungrounded, but liking the freedom of being untethered from the rest of the world. “Fever in My Heart” is the first single off Julia, Julia’s upcoming debut album, Derealization, out Sept. 30 via Suicide Squeeze Records. And, she will also be performing Aug. 28 in Long Beach as a part of Happy Sundays Music Fest, a free one-day, music, arts and comedy festival series founded by Kugel and her husband, Scott Montoya (also of Soft Palms and owner of COMA studios).
“Fever in My Heart” is an edgy, moody tune with layers of haunting vocals and a clear, disjointed feeling as if the song were trying to go in two directions at once. Though this doesn’t necessarily create an unpleasant conflict, the single is enveloping in its tense aura and is something entirely separate from anything else.
“This song is about losing yourself, losing your mind and liking it. In some weird way it felt magical to feel completely out of place in reality,” notes Julia, Julia. “I felt like I had heightened senses, like I could feel a rising vibration in my heart. Everything was falling apart but I liked it. I felt alive. I had seen a glimpse of my true self and I knew her right away. I saw a reflection that wasn’t distorted for once, and I wanted to follow it through the looking glass to the other side where I could feel totally at peace. I hadn’t known that was possible before. Layers and layers of vocals convey the confusion and ecstasy of madness. I call this my acoustic techno song since it has a dance aesthetic at its core, but the production is humble and mostly unplugged.”
The experience of finding herself in the mirror led Julia Kugel to the moniker of Julia, Julia; representative of the self and one’s reflection where the familiar, the unexpected and the unassuming all intertwine so as to be further explored.
The basis of Derealization also lies in the realm of the unorthodox, the unexplored and the unsaid. It is an experimental album where Kugel explores her art through a singular lens (Julia, Julia) as opposed to having the driving force of a band to bounce off of. The album finds Kugel playing almost all the instruments and taking on audio engineering for the first time. Be on the lookout for more new tunes from Julia, Julia.
Words: Patti Sanchez
For more on Julia, Julia, make sure to check out her Bandcamp website and follow her on Instagram and Twitter.
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