MILLY - Your Own Becoming
“a blend of the woozy, guitar-driven vulnerability of Swervedriver and the noise-laden introspection of Nineties post-hardcore trailblazers Hum” – Rolling Stone
“a band that fuses the wall-of-guitar sounds of Hum and Catherine with early emo like Sunny Day Real Estate and minimalist beauty à la Belly, resulting in a warm bath of fuzzed-out indie rock that nonetheless balances the riffing with gentler moments of airy shoegaze” – AV Club
“Meeting at the midpoint between shoegaze and ’90s-style alt-rock, “Talking Secret” lets torrents of guitars overwhelm bandleader Brendan Dyer’s hazily moody vocals” – NPR
“Crawling tempos and dazed, cinematic lo-fi… a band to watch” – Paste Magazine
“an anthemic slice of indie rock that melts into fuzzy, comforting shoegaze” – Consequence on “Drip From The Fountain”
“emo-inflected indie rock” – Brooklyn Vegan
“MILLY have put out a ton of great music that reverberates with the same whirling, ’90s-inspired grunge as Narrow Head” – Stereogum
“impeccable alternative influences, a towering instrumental presence, and an expressive main songwriter already point to a bright future for the band.” – Under the Radar
“a soundscape both comforting and abrasive” – Beats Per Minute
“A fuzz-laden jammer that re-envisages J Mascis at the head of a dream pop outfit” – Clash
Armed with towering, surging guitar riffs, crystalline and inviting hooks, and a newfound collaborative approach, MILLY’s sophomore LP feels like a total reinvention. Across 10 pummeling and undeniable songs, Your Own Becoming finds its power in channeling your darkest thoughts into something galvanizing and productive, a document of how doubling down on your art in the face of serious fear and doubt can be grounding.
Work on this release started thanks to a revelation that can only come from a period of personal crisis. Brendan Dyer, who’s dealt with anxiety for most of his life, decided to go on long walks every morning where he’d process his emotions, clear his mind, and do something that got him out of the house. “I think about death all the time,” says Dyer. “At this point in my life, I’m extremely aware of how time moves quickly.” While these thoughts could have devolved into potentially overwhelming him, this daily ritual allowed him some space. He jotted down notes from his dreams and he used his dread to grab onto the sustaining force in his life: his band. While the band’s debut LP 2022’s Eternal Ring and past tours with Swervedriver were successes, he wanted to be laser-focused on both his songwriting and his bandmates in the following year as he’d never done before.
On New Year’s Day, 2023, he corralled his bandmates to write and demo out Your Own Becoming, their most confident and organic effort to date. Dyer would take ideas he wrote down on his daily walks and each week, the band would meet up without fail. “There was newfound discipline and a renewed excitement about our music,” says Dyer. “I had always wanted to have a band that would just get together every week. Even if we’re not writing, we’re hanging out all the time, we’re listening to music together, and we’re jamming.” Dyer partly credits the collective laser focus on this album with how the band’s live lineup gelled from touring with bands like Teethe and waveform* as well as a burgeoning friendship with engineer and producer Sonny DiPerri (NIN, Narrow Head, My Bloody Valentine). “We were really inspired by him,” says Dyer. “Thanks to him we realized we could step things up a notch.”
While originally conceived as a solo project, MILLY embraced a newfound collaborative approach for Your Own Becoming, something that was only hinted at on 2022’s Eternal Ring. After a few months of painstakingly demoing songs, Dyer, along with bassist Yarden Erez and drummer Connor Frankel, decamped with DiPerri to East West Studios and Dangerbird’s Recording Studio in Los Angeles. (New guitarist Nico Moreta joined the band after recording).
Last month the band shared the blistering single “Spilling Ink,” which Alt Press praised, writing that it takes “their towering, ultra-fuzzy alt-rock into a new level of calibration.” MILLY announced the record in April with lead single “Drip From The Fountain,” by far the most infectious song of their entire catalog with an explosive chorus and airtight melodic hooks that recall early Death Cab For Cutie. The track was praised by Stereogum, Paste Magazine, Brooklyn Vegan, Rolling Stone (Song You Need To Know), and Consequence, who called it an “an anthemic slice of indie rock that melts into fuzzy, comforting shoegaze.”
Fresh off a run of dates with Narrow Head, MILLY are gearing up for an East Coast run supporting Fiddlehead and Gel, kicking off with their own headline show in New York at Elsewhere’s Zone One on July 24th. The band will return home for album release shows in Los Angelesat the Troubadour and San Francisco at Bottom of the Hill alongside slowcore pioneers Idaho. They’ll head out on a newly announced East Coast run with Balance and Composure before returning home to support Basement at their LA show on Oct 18th at Hollywood Palladium. Tickets for all shows on-sale now, available HERE. (contact us with any requests)