Darsombra Premiere “Everything is Canceled” Video; European Tour Dates Announced
Should it strike you as an ambitious undertaking for Darsombra to assemble a full visual album around their pandemic-themed, finding-freedom-in-lockdown 2LP, Dumesday Book (review here), well, it is. But the truth is that the Baltimorean experimentalist two-piece of guitarist/noisemaker Brian Daniloski and keyboardist/sparse-vocalist/video-artist Ann Everton are already well on their way. “Everything is Canceled,” which is premiering below, is the fifth clip they’ve unveiled around the 10-track record, even if “Call the Doctor” (premiered here) and “Nightgarden” predate the release itself and were for those songs as singles.
They DIY it with Everton directing, always manage to come up with something fun and/or visually interesting, and by now seem pretty comfortable applying their abstract approach in a multimedia context. Plus they did one in 2020 for their last album, Transmission (review here), so they’ve got practice at it as well. It’s Darsombra, folks. They may sound as weird as the day is long, but you can trust that whatever shenanigans they’re getting up to has genuine heart behind it because they pour everything they have into everything they do and they never fail to express a feeling, mood, or atmosphere or evoke a thought, even if it’s by putting Daniloski in a lizard mask and running the footage of him noodle-shredding backwards in one of the various domestic and foreign castles that serve as a visual backdrop.
“Everything is Canceled” (the filming wasn’t) was mostly captured on July 13, which was about a month after Darsombra‘s 2024 European tour ended — the 2025 dates with Stinking Lizaveta are below, with TBDs; help if you can. The casting call for it read in-part as follows:
“…all you need to do is to pretend to be a scholar who is driven to temporary hysterics/distraction/mania/religious fervor/anger/annoyance/strong-emotion-that-is-unpleasant by looking at/through a book on a lectern in a great hall setting. Dress is “scholarly”, especially medieval scholarly, whatever that means. Bonus points if you have your own graduation/scholar’s robe! Think many-sheets-of-paper-flying-through-the-air pandemonium. (Double bonus points if you have many sheets of paper with writing on them to throw around and recycle afterwards.)…”
You can see in the video, they did manage to get folks out for it, paper and robes and all, and they’d have had a good deal of recycling to do. Fair enough. In addition to that motif, Daniloski‘s delightfully over-the-top solo and the chants of vocals less often featured in Darsombra‘s work up to now, watch out near the end as there’s a quote that appears on screen. It reads like Chaucer, but I couldn’t trace it directly. In any case, it becomes one more part of the absurdity overarching and whatever the source, the fact that you don’t get to know feels like part of the artistic statement.
Darsombra have a southbound January run along the Atlantic Seaboard coming up in addition to the aforementioned European stint in Spring with Stinking Lizaveta — again, help out if you can; no, it’s not surprising they’d have two tours announced and the year hasn’t started yet — and all of those dates follow the “Everything is Canceled” premiere below and some words from the band that includes the reveal of the visual-album plan they’ll work on over the course of this year. Keep an eye out for casting calls.
And please enjoy:
Darsombra, “Everything is Canceled” video premiere
Darsombra on “Everything is Canceled”:
“Everything Is Canceled” is a more unusual offering for us, both in sound and vision — but also in how it came together. As part of our 2023 album, Dumesday Book, the song’s sound is enveloped in the energy of the pandemic. Ann wrote the lyrics and their melody while turning the compost in mid-March 2020, shortly after quarantine was announced, and Brian poured out the guitar solo in an inspired moment after days of having nothing to do but jam — the raw recording is featured on the track, digital glitches, a sneeze, and all. You’d think these were pretty ideal conditions for songwriting, but as we all remember, any superficial gift of time in 2020 was accompanied by a profound sense of grief for a lost reality and longing for the “before times”. Everything was canceled.
The storyboard to the video came to Ann in a dream in 2023 — one of those really vivid dreams that keeps you living in its world even after you wake up. She realized her subconscious vision by shooting on location in castles both near (in Baltimore) and far (in the EU and UK). The video also serves as a scene from a larger work, which is a feature film to our 75-minute album “Dumesday Book”. The film is about 60% finished; we expect to have it out in 2025 or 2026.
DARSOMBRA WINTOUR 2025
JAN 4 – Philadelphia PA @ Johnny Brenda’s w/ Stinking Lizaveta, Eye Flys
JAN 8 – Durham NC @ Rubies w/ Dazzling Durham Dancers Burlesque, Berry Bueno Brigade
JAN 9 – Wilmington NC @ Reggie’s w/ Street Clones, ARKN
JAN 10 – Jacksonville FL @ The Walrus w/ Severed+Said, Ian Chase, Ducats
JAN 11 – Miami FL @ The Club w/ Erratix, Dania Sixto, Robert King, DJ Nuke Em All
JAN 16 – Orlando FL @ Lil Indies w/ Bryan Raymond, Dougie Flesh and the Slashers
JAN 17 – Savannah GA @ Wormhole w/ Bathsh3ba
JAN 18 – Greenville NC @ Alley Cat Records w/ Paper Skulls, Bitter Inc., Faith Kelly, Caswyn Moon, HYPER-VCR
DARSOMBRA / STINKING LIZAVETA EUROPE TOUR
May 25 – Berlin GERMANY @ Desertfest Berlin
May 29 – Wroclaw POLAND @ Kalambur
May 30 – Krakow POLAND
May 31 – Kosice SLOVAKIA @ Collosseum
June 3 – Vienna AUSTRIA @ Arena
June 5 – Nuremberg GERMANY @ Kunstverein Hintere Cramergasse e.V.
June 6 – Potsdam GERMANY @ Archive
June 7 – Dresden GERMANY @ Veränderbar
June 11 – Brno CZECH REPUBLIC @ Kabinet Muz
June 12 – Berlin GERMANY @ Schokoladen
June 13 – Brandenburg GERMANY
June 20 – Herzberg GERMANY
More dates TBA – Please get in touch if you can help.
Darsombra is Brian Daniloski and Ann Everton.
[Live photo by Madeline Bilan.]
Darsombra, Dumesday Book (2023)
Darsombra, “Shelter in Place” official video
Darsombra, “Gibbet Lore” official video
Darsombra, “Call the Doctor” official video
Darsombra, “Nightgarden” official video
Pnictogen Records on Instagram
Tags: Baltimore, Crucial Blast, Darsombra, Darsombra Dumesday Book, Dumesday Book, Maryland, Pictogen Records
I need more Darsombra in my life. Hopefully they come back to Indiana soon.