Artists You Should Know: Desert Mambas Make A Radiant Debut On New EP “…But It’s a Dry Heat”

Desert Mambas give a spellbinding introduction on their sardonically titled debut EP …But It’s a Dry Heat. They’re also in the middle of a short run of California release shows which will conclude at Resident in Los Angeles on July 16th. As the solo project of Bailey Moses — who also moonlights as a member of Los Angeles-based four-piece Foxx Bodies — their music echoes country confessionals made sonorous by moody rock sonics.

The manifestation of …But It’s a Dry Heat occurred in tandem with the artist’s journey toward actualizing their trans identity. Aiding them in working not just through intense stage fright to perform their music but also in articulating that ongoing experience with the tenderness, honesty, and triumph it deserves.

The very first track “In the Middle” finds Desert Mambas at a crossroads and enduring the anxious pull of every beckoning direction. “I don’t think that I / Can be your girl anymore,” they sing over a radiant jangle of guitars. “But I don’t think that I / Can be your man.”

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But such paralyzing trepidation is only the eye of the storm for Moses: on the lilting acoustics of “Buzz Cut Blues” they wrestle with the confusedly-rejecting reactions of strangers toward their fresh cut. “I think I remind them of / A failed version of a man,” they coo dryly. Yet they find the reassurance of such a simple but powerful expression of identity as a buoy against the unwanted judgment of others.

Then there’s “It’s Been a While,” which saunters forward on a sizzling tangle of riffs that invoke a dusty nostalgia for their hometown in Arizona. While its final track — a dreamy instrumental oasis titled “Dry Heat” — offers up a tranquil pool of gleaming guitar tones for you to soak up like the last rays of warmth from a fading western sun.