EMBARGOED UNTIL APR 26 2024
[Richmond, VA — Apr 26, 2024] – Richmond’s own Wine & Warpaint, known for their unique fusion of catchy hooks, punk attitude, and immersive sound, have released "Shattered", the latest single from their forthcoming debut album, Disassociate (Presave here). The new single delivers a powerful blend of catharsis and mourning, capturing the emotional turbulence of personal loss with its intense lyrics and dynamic sound.
The song oscillates between heavy and light, building to an epic breakdown over screamed vocals, a rarity for the band. It’s painfully fitting, as the subject matter delves into their experience as suicide loss survivors.
“We wrote ‘Shattered’ after losing a friend who took his own life,” shares Brandon O’Neill, the band’s lead vocalist and multi-instrumentalist. “It’s a disorienting experience, and one that way too many people have to go through.”
O’Neill, who writes and records the majority of the lyrics and instrumentals for the band, noted that this song featured his first co-writing experience with guitarist Hannah Haupt.
“I sent over some hand-written journaling I had done, and Brandon combined what I wrote with some of his own journaling,” explains Haupt, who also collaborated on the instrumental demo. “Writing it was cathartic, and hopefully it helps facilitate a communal experience for anyone else going through something similar.”
“It’s a very sad song in isolation,” O’Neill clarified. “On the album, it’s contextualized a little more by songs that have more optimism and hope. We definitely resonate with both.”
The song is mixed by Will Beasley (The Dangerous Summer, Turnstile, Asking Alexandria) and mastered by Taylor Bess who also plays bass in the band.
In 2021 the band was recognized as winners of the Player Plus Studio Sessions: Powered by Fender. Each submission was reviewed by a panel of judges made up of noteworthy producers, artists, journalists and Fender Executives including:
- Fender CEO, Andy Mooney;
- Fender VP of Marketing and Head of Artist Relations, Matt Watts;
- legendary singer-songwriter and producer, Nile Rodgers (U.S.);
- Grammy nominated singer-songwriter Ashley McBryde (U.S.);
- Emily Kokal, singer and guitarist for the band Warpaint (U.S.);
- singer-songwriter and lead vocalist/guitarist for Mercury Prize-winning and Grammy-nominated Wolf Alice, Ellie Rowsell (U.K.);
- Joaquin Pavia Wakks, artist manager and CEO of Nakama Entretenimiento (Mexico);
- Director at Heartstop Music and Secretary of the Association of Artist Managers, Alastair Burns (Australia);
- and legendary Japanese guitarist, singer-songwriter CHAR (Japan).
Submissions were judged on set criteria including: songwriting, performance quality, creativity, technical guitar playing ability, originality and more. It also earned the quintet face time with Ari Herstand, CEO of Ari's Take and author of How To Make It In The New Music Business. The group was selected by this celebrity panel of music legends/executives, marking them as one of the 26 best unsigned bands in the world.
Since then, the group has gone from strength to strength, building a groundswell of acclaim and diehard fans. This single, which the group cleverly teased at the outro of a recent acoustic version of an older track on their socials, is the latest to arrive this year. Previous singles have been arriving since last year, with the latest “Codify” arriving on Feb 2 of this year.
Their debut album Disassociate is releasing June 14, with an album release show in Richmond, VA on June 15. The band strikes out on a midwest tour leading up to their album release May 22-26.
