Shane Lavers, the musician behind Chanel Beads, has become the indie breakout of the year, tipped by Lorde and Billie Eilish. His music twists sublime folk and chaotic synths into bewitching new shapes, creating a cryptic, panoramic sound that ricochets from catchy rock to dissonant experimental noise.
Early Success and Mainstream Attention
Lavers's intricate, off-kilter music has made him a hero of New York's indie rock scene and to young artists online. Billie Eilish has shouted out Chanel Beads, Rosalía has posted their music, and last year they opened for Lorde's Ultrasound world tour. With massive anthemic hooks, Lavers is a prime contender for the next white boy rock crossover, similar to Cameron Winter or Mk.gee.
The Sophomore Album: Your Day Will Come
The band's sophomore album, Your Day Will Come (not to be confused with their debut of the same name), is their biggest, boldest, and most emotionally impactful record yet. It deals with overwhelming uncertainty, as Lavers says: “I think I’ve lost some of the youthful arrogant confidence and adopted a bit more confidence with the humility of never capturing an idea perfectly because it always escapes me.”
Emotional Impact and Audience Reception
Wendy Eisenberg, Lavers's friend and former tourmate, says: “Pop music is at its most transgressive when it’s about ‘the feeling that’s too big.’ We go to pop forms because the feeling is then big enough to be handled by the collective. [Lavers] can transmute whatever he’s going through into something that sounds like a rallying cry.”
Many fans find the music hopeful, but Lavers feels the opposite: “A lot of people will come up and be like, ‘This music is so hopeful and it makes me feel like things are going to be OK,’ and to me I feel like the opposite.” The subtle conflictedness makes the music land powerfully.
Production and Sampling Innovation
Lavers has formidable command of the sonic field. Zachary Paul, who plays strings, says: “He really fucks with all the shit I record. There’s a lot of times when I actually hear the final track I’m not sure what’s me and what’s him.” Lavers also innovates with sampling, using stock audio of a man sobbing in Outside Your Life to mimic and mock catharsis. “I had this idea that instead of a melody, what if it’s just sound? It feels like I would cry right here, let me get a sound of crying,” he explains.
Personal Tragedy and Artistic Expression
The song Tyler Richard is about Lavers's late brother, who died at 19 from accidental carbon monoxide poisoning. The track features spiraling synth and samples of blood-curdling screams, dramatizing the struggle to face what pains you most. In contrast, Silver Cup features co-vocalist Maya McGrory on lead vocals, recasting ambiguity as a romantic thrill: “There is a language to your soul / I give it all I know it’s hard to believe it.”
Lavers says: “Maya and I got our spiritual and psychic armor built and strong. The best part of our collaboration is being able to help me repair and fortify that psychic armor, and vice versa.” On a record dealing with deepest doubt, the certainty the members find in each other is reason to believe in them.
Your Day Will Come is out now via Jagjaguwar.
