City Calm Down

Formed in Melbourne in 2008, the Australian indie pop quartet City Calm Down cultivated a retro new wave post-punk style aligned with other New Order and Joy Division devotees including the Horrors, VHS or Beta, and Editors. Baritone vocalist Jack Bourke, keyboardist Sam Mullaly, bassist Jeremy "Jez" Sonnenberg, and drummer Lee Armstrong anchored the group. Their opening release, the EP Movements, arrived on I Oh You Records in 2012. The following three years found the members composing songs collectively, rejecting computer-based production in favor of prolonged live jamming inside a seaside studio. That effort produced their first LP, 2015’s In a Restless House. Malcolm Besley handled production, and the album contained the single “Rabbit Run.” The band’s second album, 2018’s Echoes in Blue, functioned as a largely conceptual work centered on themes of love, pain, grief, and redemption.