The Voidz

Live in Portland July 27, 2018 | Wonder Ballroom

In 2014, the album Tyranny was listed under the band Julian Casablanca + The Voidz, however, now they’re known simply as The Voidz. Whether this was done to show the band as a more cohesive unit or not, The Voidz new album Virtue starts off with a song called “Leave it in My Dreams,” that will surely please Strokes fans because it sounds like a Strokes song. This track could easily become a radio hit, mainly because it mixes Casablanca’s sonically pleasing lyrical styling with some nice surf guitar licks. The Voidz take on many different and very specific genres in the new album: post punk from the early ‘90s, Middle Eastern electronica and even elements of early metal when Casablanca hits those Ozzie-esque falsettos. At times on Virtue it seems like band was stuck in an ‘80s video game and forced to play a vaporwave soundtrack to get out.

While all of the intertwining of different genres and sub-genres may be disarming to someone unfamiliar with Casablanca’s recent work, it only confirms his musical dexterity and the overall experimental curiosity of the band as a whole. It’s like they said, “Why don’t we just try this and see how it goes,” and it all somehow melded together to form a new flavor of music. The Voidz are an exciting band because they take on these challenges and in turn offer something new and unusual into the boring mix of psychedelic has-beens and sickly sweet pop music.