Western Education are both blessed and cursed.
The Lowell alt-rock band blasted out of the gates in 2014 with debut LP Let Your Secrets Out, a collection of razor-sharp electronic-rock anthems that all added up to something like a Greatest Hit album. Now more than two years after its release, it feels like a difficult album to top, both thematically and sonically.
UPDATE November 17: Stream Western Education’s Restless Dreams in full.
This week, the trio with a flair for modern dramatics return with “Skin Deep”, a synth blitzing first taste of a new seven-song long-form EP titled Restless Dreams. The new record, their first since Let Your Secrets Out, is out November 18 via iTunes, Spotify, and Newbury Comics.
“When it came down to making the follow-up to our debut album, I was very focused on making sure that our lead single really made an explosive first impression on our audience,” vocalist and keyboardist Greg Alexandropoulos tells Vanyaland. “I want our fans, new or old, to be excited for the new era of Western Education. Restless Dreams as a whole is a more cohesive album sound-wise, and ‘Skin Deep’ is us busting down the door and showing people what they can expect with the new album.”
And like most excellent singles, “Skin Deep” nearly didn’t make the Restless Dreams cut.
“This song was re-written several times and almost didn’t happen,” says bassist Will Hunt, who also produced the track. “We knew it could be a single, but it didn’t come together until the last minute. We didn’t even make a demo of it for pre production. Many of the elements of the song were composed during the mixing process — I hadn’t even heard the vocals until it came time to make the album mix.”
Adds guitarist Georgio Broufas: “It took me four re-writes on an acoustic guitar to come up with a chorus that we stuck with. The intro guitar riff was one of the first melodic ideas of the whole album but this song took the longest to finish. The song was originally called ‘Dirty Heart’ but I thought it was too corny and weird so I made it about something a bit more relatable which is essentially love and real commitment versus lust and how two people have two different intentions in a relationship.”
Western Education give “Skin Deep” and the rest of their new material a first spin around the dance floor come November 18, when they play UnchArted in Lowell for the official Restless Dreams record release party alongside the Color and Sound, Arms And Ears, and Shiver.
