NEW ALBUM HIGH SPIRITS//LOW LIFE OUT NOW
February 20, 2022
If you haven’t heard, Totally Unicorn’s third studio album, High Spirits//Low Life, is out now. In anticipation of its release, the band have shared the album’s fourth single, Not Winning, out today on Farmer & The Owl/BMG.
The new track sees vocalist Drew Gardner swap out screaming for singing– a very Australian snarl – but that’s not to say he doesn’t let rip as he sings about the struggling mates you just can’t help.
On the track vocalist, Gardner says “It’s about wanting to help a mate better themselves because you love them and worry about them. As much as you try, they refuse the help and sometimes you gotta let them be and figure it out themselves.”
The single is accompanied by a new video, directed by Rhys Bennett, starring TU bassist and treasure of the internet, Dean Podmore. The clip follows our lonely protagonist through the mean streets of Sydney’s Inner West during his nightly routine of debauchery, caught in a loop of addiction, incapable of breaking free of the cycle.
Bennett, says of the video “We wanted to go for a filmic look for this clip. Drawing visual inspiration from films that I love including Nicolas Winding Refn’s ‘Drive’ and the Safdie Brother’s ‘Uncut Gems,’ we wanted to make the audience almost feel sorry for our protagonist despite his happy go lucky night out of boozing and dancing alone.”
Watch ‘Not Winning’
A purge is generally followed by a binge. That’s why High Spirits//Low Life, is a gluttonous feast of black humour, animalistic energy and the promise of glitter-bomb bloody good times.
Two years ago, for album #2, Sorry, frontman Drew Gardner had looked inwards, writing radically revealing lyrics and digging nicotine-stained fingers into the hearts of sensitive types and rubberneckers alike. Let’s just say he’s in no rush to open a vein again. “The last album was such an emotional hit for me.”
With High Spirits//Low Life, he’s the bard of the back bar, a suburban stenographer of daily life, from the mundane to the highly fraught – always underscored with that gallows wit.
Produced, mixed and recorded by Lachlan Mitchell (The Hard-Ons, The Jezabels) at Parliament Studios in Leichhardt, the album is born into a world diminished by lockdowns and distancing, which makes its relatability all the more vital. At its most poignant it’s a primal scream of frustration. But bring those emotional wounds to the always-celebratory live shows and they’ll be bandaged in tinsel and streamers. High Spirits//Low Life, is out February 18 on Farmer & The Owl/BMG. Still Winning is out today on and is available on all streaming platforms here.
PURCHASE HIGH SPIRITS//LOW LIFE VINYL, CASSETTE AND ALBUM BUNDLES HERE
HIGH SPIRITS//LOW LIFE TRACKLISTING
1. Yeah, Coach
2. Tip Your Tinfoil Hat
3. Old Mate
4. Weekday Warrior
5. High Spirits//Low Life
6. The Catch
7. Fri(ends)
8. Trust Fund Glee
9. Not Winning
TOTALLY UNICORN HIGH SPIRITS//LOW LIFE ALBUM TOUR 2022
March 18 – The Curtain, Melbourne
March 25 – The Zoo, Brisbane
March 26 – Vinnies Dive Bar, Gold Coast
March 27th – Eleven Dive Bar, Sunshine Coast
April 1 – Crown & Anchor, Adelaide
April 7 – Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle
April 8 – The Great Club, Sydney
April 9 – Dicey’s, Wollongong
TICKETS ON SALE NOW HERE
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