New York musician Shane Lavers helms the project Chanel Beads, blending real, synthetic, and manipulated instruments to produce dreamy indie electronic material shaped by 1980s artists such as the Blue Nile and Prefab Sprout, plus sound collage approaches and the notion of “fake jazz,” a phrase first used by Donald Fagen. As a multi-instrumentalist, Lavers cut the project’s debut album, the ambiguously titled Your Day Will Come, issued in 2024, drawing on contributions from members of his touring ensemble.
Raised in suburban Minnesota, Lavers heard mostly country-pop and Karen Carpenter at home, while his older brother favored Southern rap and groups like Slipknot. He cultivated wide-ranging tastes via torrent sites, absorbing everything from ambient music to the Beach Boys. Upon finishing college in 2016, he moved with a friend to Seattle and began playing basement shows alongside a day job processing book orders at the Washington Talking Book and Braille Library. That position let him listen to music for eight hours daily, prompting brief thoughts of pursuing a master’s in library science. After roughly two years, however, his focus on music prevailed, and he started composing songs with serious intent. Still refining his gear and refining his aesthetic, he issued the EP Zut Alors under the Chanel Beads name in mid-2018.
Lavers later settled in New York City. By 2022 the hazy, frequently uneasy songs he was shaping—pieces informed by the pandemic and reflecting on flawed human experience—bore the stamp of the Blue Nile, Prefab Sprout, and David Sylvian. Handling most instruments himself, he tracked the debut album with assistance from a few collaborators, notably vocalist Maya McGrory (Cole) and violinist/experimental musician Zachary Paul, both of whom also perform in his live band. The “fake jazz” remark—offered by Donald Fagen in a Steely Dan documentary—shaped his studio approach, leading him to integrate synthesizers, programmed drums, processed violin, MIDI-routed bass, and vocal treatments alongside acoustic and electric guitars, live bass, percussion, and assorted keyboards. Chanel Beads signed with the prestige indie imprint Jagjaguwar, which released the project’s first full-length, Your Day Will Come, in April 2024.
