I often find myself, sometimes randomly and sometimes through my own doings, in the company of some very talented and creative musicians — it is Nashville after all. I was reminded of this a couple months ago when a friend invited me to sit in on emerging Nashville-based psychedelic rock band The Wild Jays’ video shoot for their debut single “Candy Lights.”
The Wild Jays hone sounds pleasantly reminiscent of My Morning Jacket, Foxygen and Tame Impala in the new single. “Candy Lights” comes off the band’s upcoming debut album titled Murmurations, which is set to be followed, much in the style of Bowie with Low and Heros, by second album from the Wild Jay’s within the same year.
The video for “Candy Lights” captures a Fear and Loathing-esque view on a current generational costume party scene, in which a character played by Abbey Philbrick of the Twiggs drinks a vial full of a mysterious neon potion, plunging her into an alternate state of consciousness where she joins a masked group of party goers dancing lucidly under a neon glow to the atmospheric layered vocals and big splashy drum sounds of “Candy Lights.” As if the scene wasn’t trippy enough, cue the prince of psychedelia himself Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips to walk casually through the door of the shed in Willmot’s backyard where the video is being filmed with his girlfriend Katy Weaver, who without hesitation joined the strangers in animal masks in drinking a vial of the neon potion. Why? Who really knows.
Watch the exclusive premiere of the Wild Jay’s debut single “Candy Lights” below.
-Shanning
Lockeland Springsteen 