CULK "SMOGSTAR" TOUR

In the organizer's words:

CULK, led by singer and songwriter Sophie Löw (aka Sophia Blenda), are back. And once again, the Viennese band is trying to encircle our present in all its ambivalences in their very own way. How does it feel to be a human being today in this world of limitless possibilities, existential and future fears, searches for meaning and questions of identity? On their new, fourth album, CULK immerse themselves in a state of suspension between euphoria and excessive demands. "smogstar" is once again being released by Viennese indie label Siluh Records and tells of the pulsating feeling in the in-between. Everything so exciting. Everything too much. All at the same time.

"smogstar" was recorded and produced together with Sophie Lindinger(Leyya, My Ugly Clementine). After their last album "Generation Maximum" (2023), produced by Wolfgang Lehman, was a kind of lyrical and atmospheric inventory of their generation between doomsday mood and collective hopelessness, the band wanted to shed some of the heaviness this time. "I wanted the lyrics to be more light-footed and radiate this special vibe: between feeling free and being lost," says Sophie about "smogstar".

CULK are Sophie Löw, Christoph Kuhn, Johannes Blindhofer and Jakob Herber. It all began for the four-piece group from Vienna in 2018 with their first single: the piece "Begierde/Scham", inspired by a novel by feminist icon Simone de Beauvoir. Since then, CULK have made a name for themselves with complex, self-reflective and darkly sparkling songs, mostly in German, sometimes in English. Their self-titled debut album was finally released in 2019. And 2020 saw the release of "Zerstreuen über Euch", a powerful concept album that challenges gender roles, violence and deep-rooted patriarchal structures.
Album number four is now about the endless possibilities of supposedly being able to constantly reinvent yourself. Even if you perhaps still don't know exactly who you are. A mood that is also reflected in the urban collages and drawings on the artwork, which Sophie Löw designed herself in the style of a graphic novel: The black-haired protagonist with the darkly smudged eyeliner on the cover is something like the fictional title heroine of the album, who makes her way through the haze and shimmering promise of the big city. Because as the album title already reveals: the smog and the stars are close to each other here.

In general, "smogstar" has become a decidedly urban album. "New cities, new vision. New name, new me", sings Sophie Löw in "willkommen in der dtadt", accompanied by distorted guitars that keep changing the mood. This is the basic noise of the record: the feeling of arriving in a new city, of losing yourself in urban space and its anonymity and being able to reinvent yourself and look for new allies. "It's also about allowing yourself to change," explains Sophie. "That can be exhausting and scary, but also very liberating."
Basically, "smogstar" itself is a small reinvention of CULK as a band, eight years after it all began. Johannes Blindhofer says: "For us, working on the album was also about reflecting back: Why did we start making music together and what does it mean to us?" CULK feel more influenced than ever by their environment in Vienna and the feeling of making music for and with each other. "That's why the new songs are based more on how we hear ourselves playing," he adds. "We wanted to create intensity and impact with straightforward arrangements." CULK play more freely on "smogstar" than ever before. Sophie's distinctive voice is still at the center of the hypnotic songs, but this time they sound more open, reduced and less dark. The musical references this time include the more uncompromising sound aesthetic of noise rock bands from the 80s and 90s, such as Swirlies, Sonic Youth and Unwound, as well as more contemporary bands like Julie or Blue Smiley. "We wanted everything to sound bare bones and raw and in your face. What can we get out of the four of us in the moment when we play together?", they say.

In the single "twenty, eighteen", which was released in March, the band looks back to the early days. The song slowly unfolds its musical undertow between loud guitars and buzzing synthesizers and tells of friendship and collective states of intoxication, of disorientation, being constantly on the move and the many questions that are never really answered before you have to move on to the next stage: "Is my heart full? Is my heart numb? / Did we just start or am I done?"

The new album also features the "first real CULK love song", as Sophie says. The opener - and the current single"kaputte speaker" - is about being in love and that summery feeling of freedom when the asphalt is steaming after a thunderstorm and you can't think of anything else but the person you love. The inner turmoil breaks through in the cathartic refrain with a beautifully simple declaration of love: "No one is alone with you."

But it wouldn't be a real CULK album if it wasn't more melancholy at times: In "weiß nur wer ich nicht bin", Sophie illuminates herself and at the same time the existential doubts of our time as if in clever, poetic lyrics: "Run by a thread / Yes I know you have questions / But I only know who I am not"
What we also know: CULK's pop concept has never been so consistently formulated. "smogstar" is a wonderfully nervous, flickering spotlight on our present.