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FEATURED ON THEIR UPCOMING NEW ALBUM
ALL INSIDE AQUARIUM
OUT TOMORROW VIA CHRYSALIS RECORDS
ANNOUNCE 2027 UK/EU TOUR
WEEK-LONG ART GALLERY EXHIBITION AT MILLENIUM FILM WORKSHOP IN BROOKLYN, RUNS THROUGH TO OCTOBER 13TH
UK DATES IN NOVEMBER
NYC’s BODEGA will drop their new full-length album All Inside Aquarium tomorrow via Chrysalis Records. They kicked off the celebrations this week sharing their radical reinvention of Bob Dylan’s divisive “Slow Train” and by hosting a weeklong exhibition at Millennium Film Workshop in Brooklyn (details below). Today they also announce a month-long EU/UK tour for early 2027, with tickets going on sale tomorrow alongside the album release.
Regarding “Slow Train,” BODEGA guitarist and vocalist Ben Hozie offered, “This Bob Dylan ‘cover’ (original music + Bob’s lyrics) was the first thing we recorded with producer Matt Peel as a test to see how the sessions would go. We ended up loving the track, hence its inclusion on the LP. Bob’s gospel-inspired text actually speaks volumes to the current moment.”
All Inside Aquarium was produced by Matt Peel (Yard Act, Eagulls) at the Nave in Leeds, UK, and mixed in Brighton with Theo Verney (English Teacher, Lime Garden). The album is available for pre-order, with a Dinked exclusive featuring 7” single and Cloudy Blue vinyl, along with a limited Bandcamp exclusive edition featuring hand-painted alt artwork, by Nikki Belfiglio.
BODEGA are hosting an art exhibition at Millennium Film Workshop (167 Wilson Ave., Brooklyn, NY) till October 13th. The album art for All Inside Aquarium features a photograph (by Bruno Jansen) of a handmade miniature diorama inside an aquarium made by BODEGA vocalist/percussionist Nikki Belfiglio. The miniature features references to the album; The roller coaster is from the theme-park dream that inspired the song “Astro Night Ride”, the table-set references the date-gone-wrong in lead single “Pick up the Check” and the church is the Nave studio in Leeds, UK, where the band recorded with producer Matt Peel.
The gallery will showcase Nikki’s aquarium, various BODEGA-related artworks from the past and present, and several new pieces by all of the guest contributors to All Inside Aquarium, including Henry Tyminski, Janelle Krone, Octavia Inns, Gina Tribotti, Shannon Cowan, Evan Jorgensen, Katie Hackett and Ashley Palafox.
“I never thought of us as a post-punk band,” stresses Hozie. “I just thought of us as a conceptual rock band.” This might come as a surprise to those who’ve been following the band over the last several years. BODEGA’s previous albums — 2018’s Endless Scroll, 2022’s Broken Equipment, and 2024’s Our Brand Could Be Your Life — drew well-earned comparisons to post-punk icons like Talking Heads, the B-52s, Devo, and Sonic Youth. “Post-punk is conceptual punk, so that lent itself to our thing early on,” says Hozie, “but at the end of the day, it’s about our songwriting.”
With All Inside Aquarium, BODEGA stray further from their perceived post-punk origins. The group’s goal was, “Let’s go back to melodic tunes, let’s be more of a proper rock band,” Hozie explains. Sonically, the band aimed for “this late ‘80s/early ‘90s Stone Roses-meets-Jane’s Addiction thing, with more riffing and guitar solos.”
The latter, in particular, were a major influence (Jane’s Addiction have been Hozie’s favourite band since high school), and there is indeed a palpable “Lollapalooza ‘91 Main Stage” vibe to the proceedings. “We were aiming at something larger, warmer, watery, and metaphysical, inspired by the optimistic alt rock of our half-remembered youth,” he notes.
“The way that we listen to music is so eclectic, and that’s how we approached this album too,” says Belfiglio. “You can have a hardcore song next to a folk song, because there’s no punks on the corner waiting to beat you up.” To wit, the album includes BODEGA’s radical reinvention of Bob Dylan’s “Slow Train,” the title track from his unfairly maligned 1979 album of the same name. Hozie cites the glammy, Navarro-esque solo on that track as one of his favourite moments on the album.
Where the band’s earlier material took a more explicitly sociopolitical bent, Hozie and Belfiglio’s writing on All Inside Aquarium is deliberately less didactic and more concerned with poetics.
For Hozie, “If there’s one thesis song, it would be ‘Literary World.’ It’s kind of a playful tune, but it’s really about how what we’re lacking is not political consciousness – because one of the most amazing things post-2016 is that the whole world has developed a political consciousness – but literary or poetic consciousness. A literary perspective is an empathetic one, because if you’re a novelist, you have to understand the thinking of all of your characters, even if they’re the most egregious people.” The album’s first single, “Pick up the Check,” exemplifies this approach.
BODEGA’s newfound focus on poetics also resulted in some of the most personal material to date. “I had this epiphany that on earlier LP’s, I thought of my rock tunes and my ballads as two separate categories. I realized that I mostly only delved into personal material on ballads,” Hozie says, “So I was like, ‘Why couldn’t I write something emotionally direct and personal in a fast rock song?’
“Sonics aside, such a perspective is truly post-punk. Because this is what it looks like to grow beyond the righteous rage of youthful punk: An embrace of maturity, a sense of personal and interpersonal accountability, creative ambition, an open mind, an open heart, and the readiness to reinvent. That’s what All Inside Aquarium is all about.
Catch BODEGA live:
(Tickets)
10/08-13 – Brooklyn, NY @ Millennium Film Workshop [All Inside Aquarium Art Installation + various events]
10/15 – New York, NY @ Rough Trade [in store performance, 6pm]
11/19 – Glasgow, UK @ Mono
11/20 – North Shields, UK @ King Street Social Club
11/21 – Manchester, UK @ The Abbey [SOLD OUT]
11/22 – Manchester, UK @ The Abbey [SOLD OUT]
11/24 – Bristol, UK @ Electric Bristol
11/25 – London, UK @ The Garage
11/26 – Leeds, UK @ Irish Centre
11/27 – Birkenhead, UK @ Future Yard
02/16 – Nottingham, UK @ Rescue Rooms
02/17 – Hull, UK @ The Welly
02/18 – Edinburgh, UK @ The Caves
02/19 – Birmingham, UK @ Hare & Hounds
02/21 – Kent, UK @ Tunbridge Wells Forum
02/22 – Cambridge, UK @ Junction
02/23 – Portsmouth, UK @ The Wedgewood Rooms
02/24 – Brighton, UK @ Concorde 2
02/26 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique
02/27 – Rotterdam, NL @ Rotown
02/28 – Hamburg, DE @ BETTY
03/01 – Berlin, DE @ Machinenhaus
03/03 – Groningen, NL @ Vera
03/04 – Maastricht, NL @ Muziekgieterij
03/05 – Tourcoing, FR @ Le Grand Mix
03/06 – Luxembourg, LU @ Rotondes
03/08 – Paris, FR @ La Maroquinerie
03/09 – Nantes, FR @ Stereolux
03/10 – Bordeaux, FR @ Rock School Barbey
03/12 – Milan, IT @ Arci Bellezza
03/13 – Bologna, IT @ Covo Club
03/14 – Rome, IT @ Wishlist Club
BODEGA
All Inside Aquarium
Out October 9th on Chrysalis Records
Pre-Order
01. All Inside Aquarium
02. Weather Me
03. Literary World
04. Astro Night Ride
05. Pick up the Check
06. Oxygen
07. Fear not the Fear
08. Slow Train
09. Combustible
10. Pile Driver
11. Backbeaten
12. Olivia
Connect with BODEGA:
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