Frankie Cosmos

Guided by the concise, endearing, and introspective style of singer/songwriter Greta Kline, the indie pop outfit Frankie Cosmos originated in the early 2010s as an exceptionally active bedroom solo endeavor. In the late 2000s, while still a teenager, Kline absorbed the eccentric energy of New York’s SideWalk Cafe anti-folk community, the same milieu that earlier spawned the Moldy Peaches, along with the independent spirit fostered by K Records. Her material surfaced primarily through online platforms in numerous collections, released at times on a monthly schedule. With rising visibility and impact, Frankie Cosmos issued its first studio recording and label release, Zentropy, in 2014. Next Thing followed two years afterward as the project’s initial appearance inside the Top 40 on the independent albums chart. Although Kline had already begun working with supporting musicians starting with Zentropy, the group’s first formal release credited to a quartet arrived with Vessel in 2018, marking Frankie Cosmos’ introduction on Sub Pop. The darker follow-up, Inner World Peace, written during the pandemic and issued in 2022, incorporated psychedelic and 1970s pop elements into the band’s established indie pop approach.

Born and raised in New York City, Kline is the child of actors Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates. After studying piano and drums and committing to guitar by seventh grade, she regularly attended local underground rock performances during her formative years. An introduction to a supportive circle of artists at Purchase College in Westchester prompted her to begin composing and tracking original material. Kline enrolled at NYU to study poetry. Although she started posting songs under the monikers ingrid superstar, Little Bear, and the Ingrates beginning in 2009, she left college in 2012 to devote herself fully to music and began performing and recording as Frankie Cosmos.

After dozens of self-released home recordings, Frankie Cosmos delivered its label debut, Zentropy, via Double Double Whammy in 2014; the set constituted Kline’s first studio album, realized with a complete band. She soon joined Bayonet Records, which put out the four-song Fit Me In EP the following year. Written while Kline entered her twenties, the second studio album, Next Thing, appeared in 2016, again on Bayonet. It spent one week at number 13 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart and registered as a Top 40 independent release.

In mid-2017 Kline formed the side project Lexie alongside Warehouse members Alex Bailey and Doug Bleichner, releasing the eight-track Record Time!, which Ava Luna’s Carlos Hernandez recorded and mixed. That same year Frankie Cosmos expanded into an official four-piece and entered a deal with Sub Pop Records.

Comprising Kline together with Lauren Martin on keys, David Maine (aka Main) on bass, and Luke Pyenson on drums, the group made its Sub Pop bow with Vessel in 2018. The album reached the Top Ten on the Heatseekers chart and number 21 on Billboard’s independent albums tally. Guitarist Alex Bailey, who had guested on the record, took over bass duties from Maine ahead of ensuing live dates. A digital-only set of solo piano pieces first offered as weekly singles, Haunted Items, surfaced in April 2019. Reunited with Martin, Pyenson, and Bailey, the band tracked Close It Quietly that September under engineer and co-producer Gabe Wax.

The COVID-19 pandemic removed Frankie Cosmos from touring and cast doubt on the project’s continuation. Following roughly 500 days of separation, the members reconvened to sift through approximately 100 songs Kline had composed in the interim. They ultimately captured 15 of those tracks, co-produced by singer/songwriter Katie Von Schleicher and engineer Nate Mendelsohn alongside the band at Figure 8 Recording in Brooklyn. The resulting Inner World Peace carried a more somber atmosphere than prior efforts and introduced a modest sonic evolution blending psychedelic and prog rock textures with 1970s folk, 1970s pop, and the 2000s indie rock sound familiar from Kline’s adolescent years.