New Music: Boniface - Dear Megan

Micah Visser aka Boniface seems like a sensible chap doesn’t he? After all there’s no stupid promo pic of him lounging around in a bath without water or sitting uncomfortably on a hedge like other musicians I've featured on Breaking More Waves. No, just a nice straightforward one of him sitting on a sensible but stylish chair. 

Of course the trouble here is, and at the risk of massively generalising, sensible looking people often make quite boring music. But there’s the problem – I’m generalising. Because Boniface makes very good music. That’s why I’ve featured him on the blog before and that’s why I’m featuring him again here. 

His latest, Dear Megan, is a hyperactive alt-pop banger: “Meet me in the middle of the night, it’s easy,” he sings. Ah, now we’re getting to the true bonkers and exciting inner pop star here. Because let’s face it, meeting anyone in the middle of the night isn’t that easy if you’ve been up since 6am working for your employer. But then pop stars, like all creatives don’t really do early mornings do they? Still, that’s OK when they’re doing the good stuff. And this one is the good stuff. Oh, the joy of pop!

Boniface - Dear Megan

New Music: Boniface - Phantom Limbs

Last year when Canadian whizz-kid Boniface put his debut track on line it felt like he was almost embarrassed about pop music. I Will Not Return As A Tourist was the sound of someone sneaking into the room and standing huddled in the corner for a bit before suddenly pulling out the party poppers, balloons and dancing wildly whilst spilling champagne on the carpet. Then second track Again & Again took Boniface back to being all introspective, sentimental and probably offering to pay for the carpet cleaning bill, whilst singing about ‘smoking weed and watching Hitchcock’, a little bit like Conor Oberst / Bright Eyes. However, track three, Phantom Limbs, released earlier this week, steps fully out of the closet. This is wide-eyed unashamed pop music.

Of the track, Micah Visser, who is Boniface says: “I wrote Phantom Limbs a few years ago when I was starting to become really unhappy with the way I was treating myself and the way my friends were treating themselves. I wrote it out of frustration without much redemption, and in the years since I’ve really tried to stop doing that. I think it's stuck with the band and I because it’s just really fun to play and we like that contrast.”

With big glossy hands in the air synths and a sense of euphoria in the music this one is geared up for hedonistic times. It's panoramic electronic pop for you to adore.

You can catch Boniface at SXSW in Austin, Texas this March and the Great Escape in Brighton, UK in May. 

Boniface - Phantom Limbs

New Music: Introducing - Boniface

It’s not until about two minutes and fifteen seconds into Canadian newcomer Boniface’s debut song that you’ll probably find yourself turning the dials up to maximum. I Will Not Return As A Tourist starts as a pleasant enough singer-songwriter soft-synth effort with a meandering and pictorial storyline, but if you think that’s your lot you’re very much mistaken; because before you know it someone finds the musical version of a confetti canon, pulls the trigger and we’re suddenly all lifting off to planet rave, high fiving on the glories of being alive.

There’s not much of a back storey with Boniface at the moment – all I really know is that he takes his name from where he grew up, that he appears to be a wearer of sensible pullovers and that this song is about drifting around and wanting to be a participant rather than an observer in this big thing we call life: “I can’t keep up with my mind, it’s always rushing to the next love, but when I return I swear it will not be as a tourist.” It’s released today via paradYse/Transgressive.

An alluring and curious pop song.

Boniface - I Will Not Return As A Tourist