The new cumgirl8 EP phantasea pharm kinda sounds like Sparks, if Sparks were composed of four sexy 8,000-year-old aliens. And it’s heavier on the reverb, too, you might say.
The August 2023 release marks the NYC quartet’s first on a major label, 4AD, perhaps cementing the band’s delightful frivolity with a layer of gravitas. I remember when their name started appearing on the lineups of Brooklyn venues in the carefree final months leading up to the pandemic, and I remember just as well people talking shit. “Model rock,” they’d call it. “Those girls don’t even know how to play their instruments,” they’d say.
It all felt too familiar, the sort of dismissive comments you might have encountered in this rag during its first go-round, but not while in line for a drink at Market Hotel among the enlightened culturati of 2020s Bushwick. And it’s true—the members of cumgirl8 do look like models, glamazon in both physique and presence. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t good.
I had to check my own personal biases when their EP landed in my inbox; I didn’t know whether to take them seriously either, but I admit, the fact that they had signed to 4AD made me take a closer look. And now, a few months later, I’ve been sucked into the groove: I want to go to this phantasea pharm. It’s otherworldly, somehow both ethereal and thumping with Eurotrash electronica at the same time. It’s spooky and a little unsettling, and I like it.
