‘It’s easier when nobody’s watching’: inside the secretive and sublime freak-folk of @
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- @ (pronounced "at") released their second album Autosmile on venerated indie label 4AD, with member Victoria Rose describing its themes as "turmoil, processing and acceptance"
- Victoria Rose and Stone Filipczak met in Boston's DIY scene — Rose making solo acoustic music as Brittle Brian, Filipczak from noise and experimental scenes — and reconnected during lockdown after he had returned to his native Baltimore in 2017
- The duo's 2021 debut Mind Palace Music was reissued by Washington DC indie label Carpark in 2023 after @ played their first show in 2022, turning a long-distance pandemic project into a working band
- Autosmile was written and recorded separately at each member's Philadelphia home before the pair convened at Filipczak's for final touches; local peers Nina Ryser and Garrett Burke (Gloorp) contributed to several songs
- The album's nearly seven-minute title track centers on intertwined vocal melodies and guitar, with lyrics including "I don't know how I belong to you but I do somehow / I don't know how I came to stand up to you but I have no doubt"
- @ reject offers of studio time — with Rose saying "It's easier to get something to where you want it to be when nobody's watching you," and "that includes Stone" — marking a deliberate return to acoustic guitar after their proggy, processed 2024 EP Are You There God? It's Me, @
Why it matters: For a duo that didn't play their first show until 2022 and whose debut was only reissued after that gig, signing to 4AD — a label the source calls venerated — formalizes @'s rise from obscure long-distance pandemic project to a touring act with a nearly seven-minute centerpiece on their new record.
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