PREMIERE | Sunset Lines, "Can't Sleep"
Santa Cruz by way of San Francisco’s Sunset Lines, in the artistic search of actualized serenity along the coasts of the Pacific; photographed by Brett Wiltshire.
The discovery and elation of a chance connection has the omnipotent power to completely disrupt and/or derail our regularly scheduled life programs. The exhilaration overtakes us, new dimensions are revealed to us like nothing we have ever known before. It’s the combination of excitement, infatuation, the pull of the unknown that casts aside the immediate need for rest as the night moves deep into the interplay between the moon, stars, and the obfuscated sun.
Sending out jubilant signals of summer sensations is Santa Cruz by way of San Francisco quartet Sunset Lines. Lead by Elizabeth Brooks, the band of Paul McCorkle, Brett Wiltshire, and Adam Soffrin create sensational percussive bops that radiate like beams of warm California sun that pierce through the fog, casting its light on the closely embraced sentiments that stretch all across the sands. From their upcoming album debut The Longest Day in June, Brooks and company chronicle their own personal NorCal movements, while reveling in states of relentless restlessness that stand as une raison de célébrer.
Featuring a cult cinematic visual directed by Jono Basilios, produced Vanessa Tomasello, camera work by Philip Lima, with lighting design by Isaac Hulter; Sunset Lines turns the song into a roller rink event fit for a midnight matinee. Liz and the sunsetters partake in the other great American pastime of skating beneath the glittering light of the disco ball. The song and video serenely skates in the forms of figure eights around everything from romantic realizations and dramatic b-movie hijinks. Breezing along all fancy free with that vintage VHS analog veneer, the interplay between everyone in the rink skates around a mysterious gloved antagonist that leaves a trail of roller-skate enthusiasts in their wake. The mystery continues to deepen as the question becomes who, or how many individuals may be behind the elusive gloved phantom, turning out lights and leaving behind bodies in their wake.
Beyond the band's throwback late night monster movie-styled visuals, "Can't Sleep" bounces to the beat that proceeds to dance the night away. Sunset Lines send us a song that is all about the life redefining reasons of why we eschew sleep in favor of embracing a night that we never want to end. An anthem to scare away the rising sun in the hopes of holding on to a discovered bond that a series of moments that we wish would ride on for a wondrous eternity. Sunset Lines sails swiftly into the evening of a moonless night, holding off the inevitable break of dawn and holds tighter to those folks after dusk that transform our life indelibly from that night on.
Sand, shades, solar soirees, the Boardwalk, and Sunset Lines; photographed by Brett Wiltshire.
Liz Brooks from Sunset Lines shared some words on the formative developments of the new song:
“Can’t Sleep” started as a sketch brought in from our bass player Brett — a dancy, looping, rhythmic idea built around a steady pulse. We knew there was definitely something there, but we could never really get it to feel like a Sunset Lines song. We worked on the song over and over for nearly a year — like insomnia itself, it felt repetitive, unresolved — a thought that had to be re-written after so many times around the turntable to make it speak to us.
We learned to lean into the tension and necessity of the process — as a song and arguably as a band. We layered melody over momentum, harmony over insistence. The song started to click as we figured out what it wanted to be — something cinematic and strange, a dark pop-noir dreamscape that thrums with late-night energy and emotional ambiguity. The final version is part thriller, part secret diary, and entirely what we turned it into out of our minds' eye.
Ringing in summer proper by the pool with Sunset Lines; photographed by Brett Wiltshire.
Lyrically, it explores the anxiety and adrenaline of a relationship born in the dark — all the secrecy, the thrill, and the paranoia. The opening lines feel deceptively simple, but there’s unease just beneath the surface:
I always like the way you’re kinda quiet / but you’re loud in my mind tonight...
That duality — between what’s said and what’s felt (which is also reflected in the call and response elements of the song)— became the foundation of the arrangement.
Sunset Lines’ debut album The Longest Day In June is slated for release on July 10.
