SYDNEY ARTIST SWIMWEAR UNVEILS THE FIRST VIDEO TO ACCOMPANY HIS ANTICIPATED UPCOMING ALBUM ‘NIGHT AIR’ KICKING OFF WITH CHAPTER ONE: ‘HAPPYNESS’
"The song is laced with funky basslines and woozy synths to create the perfect dream pop track. With melodic vocals and a steady soft drum rhythm, listeners are taken to a boogie wonderland where they are free to move around with every inch of their body."
– Madison Woods, Trouble Juice
“If its lead single is anything to go by, the conceptual entity that is Night Air is undoubtedly on track to become one of the most immersive and intriguing releases shared this year.”
– Tyler Jenke, Rolling Stone
Sydney’s Tim Derricourt aka Swimwear is excited to reveal a new music video for his first single to be lifted from his upcoming debut album Night Air. ‘Happyness’ was released Thursday 24 September presenting an intriguing new direction for the Dappled Cities singer songwriter’s solo project, switching out the gated snares and driving kick of earlier work, and opting for a more atmospheric style, drawing on influences like The Blue Nile, Majical Cloudz and Brian Eno. The result is as captivating as it is boundary pushing, incorporating frenetic spoken word samples, an incessantly funky bassline, and woozy synths in a sprawling display of blissed out dream pop.
Directed and edited by Brooke Goldfinch, the video features Derricourt as a lost soul half stumbling, half dancing his way through a moonlit suburban landscape to the wobbly disco soundtrack that is ‘Happyness’. Its imagery perfectly captures those late-night feelings of isolation and ambivalence but also the simple, individual joy of being alone, on the road, after midnight, with nowhere to go and no one expecting you back. From dockside rock pools to underground car parks to Kmart’s colourful sporting aisle, Derricourt succumbs to an impulsive kinetic energy of waltzing and shuffling with a spring in his step and a dull thud in his chest.
“This is a story that is becoming all too familiar - an idea, a dream that was disrupted, altered, due to Covid - and had to become something else. I had always wanted to make a clip of me dancing, the way I do on stage - with total abandon, weirdly, ungainly, with no plan. And this seemed like the perfect opportunity. I enlisted the help of good friend and brilliant filmmaker Brooke Goldfinch to join me on the ride. We made a test clip using our phones, and took to the oddest and quietest of places to do a test shoot of me, a dancing man, on his own, in his own world. But then - Covid. And what was test footage, quickly made on a phone, ended up being the footage we had! But from a set-back came the challenge. And the clip became its own thing - a wonky, odd little gem, capturing the weirdness of one man, dancing alone, in the face of oncoming change in the way we live our lives.” – Tim Derricourt, Swimwear
Swimwear’s debut album Night Air, is slated for release a little later in the year with Chapter One: ‘Happyness’ / ‘When We’re Alone’ out now via Believe. Moving away from the upbeat ‘80s pop of his first three EPs (The Kissing Machine, Low Summer, High Summer), Swimwear has crafted an ambient, misty world that incandescently reflects notions of seclusion and uncertainty alongside glimmers of hope. Inspired by Richard Yates’ 1962 novel Revolutionary Road and its images of suburban loneliness and burnt out love, Night Air is an ambitious concept album released in Chapters across seven expansive tracks that chart the explosive start and simmering disintegration of a relationship, and an enticing new world beckoning beyond.
Night Air Chapter One: ‘Happyness’ is out now via Believe, listen here
