PREMIERE SLIPS, "Drawing Lifelines On"

Bopping about in the blue with SLIPS, from left: Alex Bhore and Teddy Georgia; photographed by Daven Martinez.

The merging of minds and mediums offer new platforms, points of perception, and explorations that invert the ephemeral and abstract for something tangible, turbulent, and visceral. Poetics that stem from places that are deeply personal can be experienced and observed through magnified lenses where inner open-ended inquiries are expanded in a panoramic scale. Employing sensibilities of haute maximalism displays the battles of miasma, manifestations of the self, needs, desires, fantasies, and the fulfillment of all the aforementioned and more through impressionistic art forms that reveal these ruminations and revolutions of the id in radical—and relatable—new ways.

Creating these new avenues of collaborative expression are SLIPS with their breakout debut “Drawing Lifelines On”. The duo of Teddy Georgia and Alex Bhore converge their respective ranges of talents and repertoires together to make stylistic songs centered around concepts of security, sensuality, sentimentality, and all the various thoughts and notions that surround the subject of the self facing off with the whirlwind cycles that assemble our worlds. Georgia, known for work in Death Valley Girls, Pearl Earl, and a host of multidisciplinary art installations and textiles work, in hand with Bhore’s work in sound installations for Meow Wolf, engineering/production/etcetera at Elmwood Recording in Dallas, percussion in This Will Destroy You, and collaborations with countless acts; together the two friends flesh out an album rooted in a visceral vulnerability, portraits and perils of vanity, and the emotion and dreams that ride the rails with a hyper-charged velocity [complete with a mastering assist from Dave Cooley].

SLIPS flips the idealistic tables over on “Drawing Lifelines On”, broadcasting transmissions from the underbelly of cyclical situationships. Teddy’s torrid tales and unabashed revelations are blended into a fuzzy fusion of undulating electronic treatments where guitars, synths, and other such instrumental systems implode upon each other in a quaint, claustrophobic underground. SLIPS both lyrically and musically muses on the tightening constraints of tension and the reprieve sought as places and points of respite to gather together thought, collect one’s breath, and realign priorities and definitions of goals.

Teddy and Alex chronicle the threads of where we draw our timelines, the intersections where strangers become potential suitors, the divergences and divorces in these geometrical trajectories, and the points where one can discover personal purpose, and those ever elusive (not to mention, preferable) upward trends. “Drawing Lifelines On” offers harsh lessons on parasocial to social conversion misfires, the ways in which we misread others, and ultimately the manners in which we misread ourselves in the process.

Featuring visuals directed by by SLIPS and Daven Martinez, assisted by Hassan Seoudi, edited and animated by Blair Rowan — they twist together distorted images of the artists in a helix of digitized ice and rock. The muddles and standoffs of the sentimental and spiritual turn, freeze, and burn in the lyrical visualizer that seeks a transcendence of embracing an abundant existence with beloved friends, eschewing the tired tropes of gods and masters, and building a life and world with more genuine meaning, and heightened degrees of sincerity in all involved exchanges.

Teddy Georgia and Alex Bhore provided their following thoughts on their collaborative new track:

Teddy

I wrote the first verse of “Drawing Lifelines On” whilst sobbing on an airplane. I was in my mid-20s and had never been single in my adult life. I had just spent three days in a nice man’s bunk bed, trying with all my might to make us fall in love. Instead we watched The Deer Hunter and I got a UTI.

The rest of the song unfolded over a few years, a new verse arriving each time I repeated this pattern. I knew I wanted to build a home with my best friends, but instead I kept shoving all my energy down the throats of my lovers, and I couldn’t figure out why. Every line helped me dig a little deeper, until I hit the root.

Cover art for SLIPS’ single “Drawing Lifelines On”.

Alex

I felt very strongly about “Drawing Lifelines On” from the moment I heard Teddy’s demo. It was so lyrically visceral and I knew that the surrounding sonics needed to strike the same balance of relentless and delicate. The recording process was a bit of a journey; it wound up being both the first song we started tracking for this album and the last one to be finished. Early iterations were centered around guitar, slower and in a different key, but the final version ultimately came together very quickly and possesses an urgency that I’m proud of.

SLIPS’ “Drawing Lifelines On” is available now.

Catch their first show June 27 at the Texas Theatre in Dallas.