Hear Palm Ghosts’ soaring post-punk single, “Carry the World”
On Friday, March 19, Nashville post-punk group Palm Ghosts will release their new album Lifeboat Candidate. It’s the band’s fourth album, and it carries a heavy dose of ’80s-inspired gloom in the vein of The Cure or Joy Division.
Today, the group debuts their new single, “Carry the World,” a melancholy synth-laden track that employs some of those dark, vintage aesthetics in a melody that’s soaring and climactic. It feels at times like U2 as they were making their transition from wiry post-punk group to stadium-filling rock anthems—Palm Ghosts have a hazy aesthetic, but “Carry the World” is big on melody, hooks and emotion.
The band’s Joseph Lekkas says of the song, “Carry the World is inspired by stories of family separation in Scientology. The song is an epic synth-based banger with linear drum parts and big vocal harmonies. The original inspiration came from the early sounds of new wave band OMD. This is probably the most pop oriented song on the record, firmly routed in the sounds the ’80s that the band is most known for. Plus, only Ben Douglas would decide to write a Scientology break up song.“
Listen to Palm Ghosts’ “Carry the World” below.
Jeff Terich is the founder and editor of Treble. He's been writing about music for 20 years and has been published at American Songwriter, Bandcamp Daily, Reverb, Spin, Stereogum, uDiscoverMusic, VinylMePlease and some others that he's forgetting right now. He's still not tired of it.