They seem like nice guys, so we’ll forgive Pets for the keystroke quandary presented by the title of their debut LP. Available October 21, the self-released 🌀❓(Spiral Question Mark) is the charmingly idiosyncratic result of three years of seeking out and assimilating for music-geek siblings Jonny and Nick Campolo. Products of New Hampshire’s 18-mile coastline, the smallest of any state, the brothers are also short on preconceived notions when it comes to influences. They’re fans of everyone from Neil Young, Carole King and Stephen Sondheim to Leonard Cohen, the Blue Nile’s Paul Buchanan and Talk Talk’s Mark Hollis.
The Campolos had already begun deconstructing their traditional songwriting through various samplers and synths when they met Chase Ceglie, a Rhode Island-based songwriter, producer and saxophone ace. Bonding over a shared love of theatrical scores and improvisation, they traveled to Ceglie’s home studio to track some songs live, later adding nuance and texture in the form of various effects and field-recording techniques. Spiral Question Mark incorporates those sessions with work from a previous run-in with producer Jonathan Schenke (Parquet Courts, Liars, Dougie Poole) in New York City. The result suffuses the opaque predictability of modular drum machines and sample-heavy processing with the analog spirit embodied in organic instrumentation like piano, guitar, sax, clarinet and flute.
As for “Elevator,” Jonny pegs it as a mopey song by a happy dude. “I’m generally in love with life—ask my girlfriend of 14 years, who’s now my wife,” he says. “But ‘Elevator’ is a longing, drawn-out memory—the sad kind of vivid. It’s the feeling of unrequited love and its destructive honesty—or being in love with waiting … like you’ve arrived on your floor, but the door stays closed, and you’re caught just standing there.”
In keeping with that theme, the video depicts an art deliveryman’s strange encounter with an elevator. “He’s no longer resistant to its alluring buttons,” says director Joey Frank (MGMT, Weyes Blood). “It seduces this young man and inspires a romantic proposition.”
We’re proud to premiere Pets’ “Elevator.”
—Hobart Rowland
