Queer alternative trio Blankslate hails from Denver, CO and is on the verge of releasing their very first full-length album. Their first single “Bell Station” came out on October 7th with the B-side “High Street.” Their full album drops at the end of the month – on October 28th. Their publicist compares their sound to MUNA mixed with Missy Higgins and a drop of Greta van Fleet.
What a combo!
Rock the Pigeon asked the band members to pick one of their favorite songs from the album and give us a blurb “in their own words.” Enjoy, listen to the new singles, watch their music video for Bell Station, and enjoy!
Rylee on “Aptos”
Growing up, I spent a lot of time in a little seaside town south of Santa Cruz called Aptos. My grandparents live across from the beach, down the way from the town’s main drag. There’s a beautiful shipwreck moored on the pier. A little shack called the Pixie Deli serves the most incredible French toast every morning. It’s my favorite little corner of the world. When I came out as trans, it felt like this sacred thing I couldn’t really deconstruct, so I started looking at it through the lens of growing up in Aptos and knowing I was a girl. I hold both of those things — Aptos and transness — really close to my heart and wrote this song a day or two after coming out to Tess and Em. It was really empowering to put all of that into a song, and I feel like “Aptos” has become this really foundational grounding point as I’ve transitioned. At shows, it’s been really cool to hear how people — queer and not — relate to the song. I think that points to the universality of being trans as a human experience like so many others.
Tess on “Die & Run”
Every song on this album was written specifically for the album, except for one. Die & Run was created back in a dusty dorm room basement in 2019 and has grown alongside us ever since. We could not have predicted that our first attempt at nonsensical storytelling would become such a staple of our identity years later. Die & Run is one of those songs that’s been through every iteration of edits, just to end up two feet from where it started. But sometimes you need to take projects miles from where they began in order to land back at the starting point. Die & Run has kept me grounded through the entire process of creating a 12-song album and frankly, feels very much like a close friend. I hope our listeners can feel that sense of stability within a song about chaotic …murder?
Emma on “little love (i, ii, iii)
Singing the songs on this album, I focus on externalizing a story in service of connecting with all who are listening. The guttural push in my abdomen is inspired by a need to evoke something in the audience; something reciprocal (the most delicious feedback loop).
When I sing Little Love, though, I’m singing to myself. I’m desperately and relentlessly pleading with the spirit of my younger self to come back because I’ve come to realize that full embodiment and internal reintegration necessitates saving that little me. It’s a reckoning of sorts, as I come to realize at some point in those 6 minutes that the atrophy and the segmentation little me went through were catalysts for me.
