[author disclaimer – dates could differ based on Australian time zones]
So my favourite band dropped a new album.
On April 14th, 2023, the now out-grown Houston band Waterparks – frontman Awsten Knight, guitarist Geoff Wigington, and drummer Otto Wood – released into the world their fifth studio album, ‘Intellectual Property’, (IP) on the label Fueled By Ramen.
This would be the actual amalgamation of the colour red into the Waterparks universe, with texturized album art ornate with a petite poison dart frog of religious guilt.
Throwing it back to January 28th, 2022, where an uncaptioned Instagram post of the word ‘ALRIGHT’ in the front man’s signature handwriting on a plain bright red background announces the return to the dizzying reality of social media and, in turn, a new Waterparks era. As with previous albums, the entire musical chairs process of album curation to distribution is more qualifiable as the Waterparks album experience than just the final release, and this would be the start of something new.
Now, over 12 months later and the era has reached its fully-fleshed release date, with a total of 11 songs placed into the intellectual minds of the public. Myself, a die-hard Waterparks fan, included.
I’ve written pieces on this band before. In fact, I have even ranked every album, although none of that even continues to stand up to a time when I can never agree with a previous version of myself’s ranking. Alas, a lot of things I will say here will not be the first time I, or anyone, has said them.
THE ROLL OUT
As much as I love having a full album in its entire artistry in my hands, the just as articulate and detailed rollout of the project is perhaps even more exciting to me. I am a nerd about art, and my belief in it as a whole, and curating every aspect to be something within itself. Which is exactly what Waterparks does.
Especially, when building an atmosphere. “Greatest Hits was an indoor nigh time album, Intellectual Property is an outdoor day time album” The band has reached a point where laying it out to you, aspect by aspect, colour to colour, and environment is expected, and in my opinion, needed. Drip feeding the audience details that are often not even thought of by artists. Waterparks aren’t just the music, it’s the experience, and that’s the way I’ve been describing them to others for years. None of these songs would be just as impactful without that technicoloured tonal emphasis wrapped around them like cellophane.
April 8th, 2022 we got the first single title, ‘FUNERAL GREY’. April 19th, an audio snippet. May 3rd, “It’s probably time to let you hear more than 3 seconds of FUNERAL GREY”. May 5th, the single cover art and song release date. And on May 13/14th (time zones and all), we finally had the first song off the anticipated album. The entire process takes over a month, the build-up, the teasing, the excitement. Every little thing is calculated and artistic.
WATERPARKS AREN’T JUST THE MUSIC, IT’S THE EXPERIENCE
For the next year, this similar approach was constructed across the rest of the singles – ‘SELF-SABOTAGE’, ‘FUCK ABOUT IT (ft. blackbear)’, ‘REAL SUPER DARK’, and ‘BRAINWASHED’. “See that’s why I like letting things sit and find its audience on its own”. All the while the band took on multiple different tour loads, such as opening for the legendary My Chemical Romance, and playing the unheard songs live before release. Generating this power and reputation behind each track, this shrill of animated anticipation. There is something to the experience of listening to some dingy, crackled concert audio clip on Soundcloud because it’s all you’ll have for a year. None of this is accidental, un-orchestrated, or without purpose and Waterparks know exactly what they’re doing to be heard for their art.
TRACK BY TRACK BREAKDOWN
I just want to be clear here that a lot of this is personal interpretation of course, so naturally please do not take everything I say to be factual for I am not the wonder that is Awsten Knight. However, here is a blog post that Travis M. Riddle, a close friend of the band and author wrote about the album.
STARFUCKER
It is known that the best, dare I say only, way to listen to a Waterparks album is by following a certain list of instructions. “Listen with the lights off, unless you have some wild lighting you love. No Twitter or social media just for a little. Just be in it.”
Now, where am I going with this? The opening line to the whole album is “like, take a breath, close your eyes and shit”. As a long-time fan that was already like a gut punch. And what a ride I was about to be taken on.
‘STARFUCKER’ is the polychromatic opener to the piece, and is an euphoric taste to the ultimate testament of ‘Intellectual Property’.
It utilises fourth wall breaking, an intricate and twinkling atmosphere, with an overall radio essence to me. This is a notable detail in regards to the LP’s closure sample being a radio interview.
‘STARFUCKER’ gives a hyper-pop promise, with drastically contrasting vocals. It has this feeling of being bold, yet not large. Almost like when you are first meeting someone and you can feel the presence they have, however, you two are still strangers and aren’t quite to that all-experiencing, knowable level.
With a multitude of lyrical parallels:
“I’m gonna move out of my loft and into a limousine so I can drive you fuckin crazy” // “My demons drive a limo, straight up to my window” [‘Fuzzy’, Greatest Hits].
“I’ll always be around, in fact” // [‘I’ll always be around’, Double Dare.]
In my notes, I jotted down the comment “ping pong sounds tickle my brain’, and there is no other way I could word that. ‘STARFUCKER’ cuts off dramatically and artistically mid-sentence to do that fourth-wall-breaking thing again. “I’m saying picture that but, like, right before things go dark.” Only to, perfectly and appropriately, thrust you right into ‘REAL SUPER DARK’.
REAL SUPER DARK
RSD was the fourth single we got in the lead-up to the album, and dives into a depth of playful inner child. All the while channelling “early Eminem that’s not like stabbing women, you know what I mean, like you need to like tap into like a kind of cartoonish energy”, to empathise the tracks caricature. Particularly with “Let me speak to your manager/oh you mean Benji? He’s fuckin busy, cause I just drove through AP on my brand new jet ski”. The comment around inner child essence here is super interesting as further down the album, Track 8 ‘RITUAL’, will have direct inner child lines.
Commencing with a dark, quite alarming tone, ‘REAL SUPER DARK’ is a passive-aggressive, hyperactive track. It’s bratty, it’s rocky, and it’s boppy. There is the repeating elemental cycle of ups to downs, and whirlpool emotions sold to you via dazzling production and vocal range.
“My fans are the best, they’d love me more dead.” // “I guess at least my work is working right? I think people like me better when I’m hurt inside.” [‘Lowkey As Hell’, Greatest Hits].
Personally, here I feel so deeply that this is related to select themes off ‘Fandom’. Especially regarding fan perception, fan relationships, and virtual love. “You don’t love me the same, it’s a fuckin shame, I’ll never be enough until it’s too late.” [‘Watch What Happens Next’, Fandom]. “Do you believe in love, oh, is it because of me? Yeah, it’s up to me, am I the boy you dreamed of?” [‘Dream Boy, Fandom]. To even go back to my comment on virtual love, that is even a direct parallel to ‘Intellectual Property’s ‘A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH’. ‘Fandom’ held so much commentary about fan/artist dynamics, and each album since has displayed an impacting element from that, stalking to the hiding aspects from socials. This specific line can also heavily relate to ADHD Rejection Sensitivity Disorder (RSD), which is something Awsten even hinted at via Tiktok.
“But, baby, it’s gettin too loud.” // “Loud gets lonely.” [‘Tantrum’, Entertainment].
FUNERAL GREY
The one that kicked off it all, ‘FUNERAL GREY’ is a testament to capturing exactly what Waterparks were after with “THE ESSENTIAL WATERPARKS ALBUM, IT’S THE BEST AND IT’S MY BABY”.
Ethereal and weightless, track three of the LP shifted gears into the realm of opulent tones. This is the song that really yells outdoors to me, and I believe that is why it 1000% was the perfect first single. The layering of ‘FUNERAL GREY’ is so soft and near delicate. “It feels like the woo in the chorus.” [me, from my notes app].
“And now I’m trippin off the deep end.” // “I’ve been living dark in the back of the deep end.” [‘Snow Globe’, Greatest Hits].
“It’s 3AM, she walked in.” // “Now it’s 3AM everybody goes home alone.” [‘Snow Globe’, Greatest Hits].
“I know your dying wish is to be baptised in my spit.” Head dives into one of the largest themes of the album, religious guilt, something that appears frequently and often juxtaposed with the idea of something sexual. “…But the album itself has to do with overcoming, unlearning and growing past religious guilt. It’s something that I’ve struggled with for a long time.”
“Are you hearin me when I say you’re bleein me out with all the things you don’t say, I’m livin fuckin betrayed.”
RITUAL
BRAINWASHED
‘FUNERAL GREY’ is followed up with the fifth single, one that is arguably of my top songs off the album. This one right here! This one means a lot to me. I emotionally projected myself onto ‘BRAINWASHED’ which you are free to interpret that about me however you like.
Layered in emotional connections and association parallels: “I’m see through, need you.” // “I want you to need me like I need you, I need you to see me when I’m see through.” [‘Powerless’, Double Dare]. // “It’d be so nice to see you inside of somethin more see through.” [‘Last Heaven’, Demo Album]. // “Nice to fucking meet you, let’s get a little see through.” [‘Watch What Happens Next’, Fandom]. // “2015 was cold and I was see-through.” [‘I Felt Younger When We Met’, Fandom].
Instantly, there is a differing instrumental appearance of some guitars. Similar, to me, to ‘FUNERAL GREY’, but rather deeper. ‘BRAINWASHED’ is driving with the windows rolled down, in an Australian coastal summer track. Playful and delightful, and overall to me is seamlessly lovely.
“It’s been a week, I’m still at your house.” // “You’ve been at my crib for like the seventh day up in a row.” [‘FUCK ABOUT IT (ft. blackbear)’, Intellectual Property].
These two tracks are read as polar opposites, this concept of hyper-fixation and hyper-avoidance, commonly experienced within the mentality of nondivergent individuals, like those with ADHD. It is such a panicle example of the fuckery of emotions this entire piece of art represents, the intellectual property of it all. Everything is incredibly detailed and crafted with a level of care and preciseness that nothing is truly accidental here.
Now really I should be just slamming the entire second verse here, because Awsten Constantine Knight what in the HELL and HOW DARE YOU. But alas, I will contain myself. It’s more hyper and paced faster. It is again that up-and-around emotive course.
“It’s like my brain isn’t mine, you moved into my mind, dropped your bags, drew the blinds.” // “You moved in behind my eyes and built yourself a shrine.” [‘I Felt Younger When We Met’, Fandom].
“Oh, I don’t wanna leave, it’s freakin me out” // “It freaks me out, it freaks me out.” [‘REAL SUPER DARK’, Intellectual Property]. Which again, reads so much into the ADHD symbolism.
2 BEST FRIENDS
An exaggerated tonal shift that is swift and quick, much like any conceptualised emotive content expressed across the album. ‘2 BEST FRIENDS’ even links directly back up to the previous track with the line “yeah, with the blinds drawn and the lights off.” // “Dropped your bags, drew the blinds.” [‘BRAINWASHED’, Intellectual Property].
The song features a fast-paced and energetic, cartoon sound. It is, in part, separate from the other dynamics built across the album, to portray this simplistic, mantra of sorts. However, the fact and the way it does just that is quite dynamic within itself, which goes to highlight the artistry and purpose ‘Intellectual Property’ displays.
“You hit back with the syntax.” // “I’ll paint you pretty with my syntax.” [‘Never Bloom Again’, Fandom].
END OF THE WATER (FEEL)
‘END OF THE WATER (FEEL)’ is interesting to me because of the dual perception in production to drive home this theme and intent of emotive juxtaposition that we see largely displayed in tracks previously such as ‘BRAINWASHED’. This is extra special to me as the title has FEEL in brackets, which I’m going to express this idea of emotive content, repress-ment, and disassociation that’s present across IP.
What struck me the most when first listening to this record and this track specifically was not just vocal range but vocal intent. Directly beforehand with ‘2 BEST FREINDS’, we are listening to a jingle of sorts, it’s juvenile (that’s not a bad thing), and it is funny and quirky in tone. The production here instantly is elevated, more grown, something that was purposefully stripped back in 2BF and purposefully presented here to curate separate and intimate points of that intent. ‘END OF THE WATER (FEEL)’ explores pretty layers and delicate high notes to start, before clicking off and saying “wait”. To start with we are presented with something so romantic in tone, illustrated with lyrical explorations of “If you feel it, then I can feel it too, if you need me, all I need is you,” before literally being told to wait and bouncing into this theme of dis-attachment, harder vocals, and speedy deliveries of “We ghost each other for a week at a time? Both waiting for each other to reply.” I have mentioned it before, and I’ll say it again, this fuckery of emotions, dopamine highs and lows is everywhere on this record.
“If you feel it, then I feel it too.” // “Do you feel it too?” [‘Telephone’, Fandom].
“Make plans and let em fall through.” // “Make plans and break them to see what you say.” [‘SELF-SABOTAGE’, Intellectual Property].
Knight is many things, and a lot of that is intentional, calculated, and by all brilliant means artistic. This track strikes me as an essential point of the album, I don’t think IP would be what it is without it, it is an integral aspect of the artistry here.
“And the distance keeps us safe, but nobody told me that safe is so lonely.” // “But I’ll just stay alone because alone is safer than being with you.” [‘High Definition’, Fandom].
And yeah, there’s a Kurtis Connor feature! ( KURTIS IS HERE? KURTIS! )
SELF-SABOTAGE
This was an early single that really indoctrinated how important and attached I would be to this album. There are a million reasons, concepts, and personal justifications for that. But for now, ‘SELF-SABOTAGE’ was the song that made me scream and cry and, funnily enough, hyper-fixate.
‘SELF-SABOTAGE’ is bold, brightly lit, and introspective. Diving through layers and high notes, packaging up a perfect recipe for a sparky, epic cinematic, and dynamic melody. Rich in taste and brilliance, track seven illustrates the uncomfortable realities and inner struggles of connection. The absolute dramatic sense of it all.
“It’s avoidable, I’ll destroy chances to be better than I was before you and me now we’re at the part where you’ll hate what you see, what the fuck is wrong with me?”
“The syndrome feels Stockholm, I’m like, do you wanna keep me on lock though?”
BRAINWASHED
RITUAL
I had this feeling ‘RITUAL’ was going to be one of the songs I would be obsessed with when the complete album was dropped, and you know what? It is. I partly had this feeling because of the reviews and commentaries about how ‘RITUAL’ was a darker element, which is something I eat up.
“My inner child needs a bullet proof vest.” // “It’s like a whole like like bombastic Larger than Life Crazy Character version of you, you know what I mean, so what do you turn on to get there? Inner child, you know what I mean, like what is your inner child…” [Awsten Knight, about REAL SUPER DARK].
Sampling a high school Sex Education video, ‘RITUAL’ blows up in your face with something that has only been sprinkled within previous tracks if you know where to look: Religious Guilt. Instantly this song is darker, it’s grained in-depth and exposition which stands apart, but not at all excluded from the entire project. Sound-wise this song is so insane that I don’t feel qualified to even talk about it in the right way. You almost think ‘RITUAL’ is bass-forward, but rather it’s almost as if it is a step or two down a ladder.
“And a phone that can’t text.” // “I wish I was dead sometimes so I wouldn’t have to check my phone.” [‘Just Kidding’, Greatest Hits].
“Never knowin what’s next, next.” // “Watch what happens next, yeah yeah.” [‘Watch What Happens Next’, Fandom].
FUCK ABOUT IT
Synth Girlie Pop Summer Day Anthem ft. Blackbear. That is what ‘FUCK ABOUT IT’ exudes to me. While this track was a single release, it was as if hearing it for the first time again when listening through the record, because ‘FUCK ABOUT IT’ stands on its own for sure, but paired with the mass amount of contextual importance ‘Intellectual Property’ displays, this track breathes an entirely new light and reality.
As well as the way this track feels like a prequel to ‘Fandom’s ‘Turbulent’, they’re defiantly cousin songs to me. This is significant when placed with this idea that ‘FUCK ABOUT IT’ and ‘BRAINWASHED’ are inter-twined opposite, sister songs. It’s like the MCU of Waterparks and their art, you’ve gotta be obsessed enough and willing to put the time in for everything to synch up through hidden Easter eggs and minuscule, perfectly timed references.
“I hate the aftertaste” // “Yeah, I kissed a couple people, but they taste wrong.” [‘2 BEST FRIENDS’, Intellectual Property].
“But it’s kinda hard to miss who’s never gone.” // “It’s like, who wants to be close with someone who always goes away?” [‘High Definition’, Fandom].
CLOSER
Once upon a time, in a Zack Zang interview as I like to quote so much, Knight mentioned the fact that IP could have ended with ‘CLOSER’, and I understand him.
“Awsten: It feels like the first two songs are both intro tracks and the last two songs are both outro tracks…when I hear the end of, um, of CLOSER I’m like that could be the end of the album. When that ends I’m like – because I’m like a big nerd about track order you know I’m kind of like a purist in that way about albums –
Zack: So you want us to listen to the whole thing in order?
Awsten: Please…But no like the album could end with CLOSER . It’s – and then to me like a night out on Earth feels like this like massive Encore track.”
Awsten Knight | Waterparks, Intellectual Property, Otto, My Chemical Romance, 2023, Zack Zang Show
If ‘CLOSER’ had been the final song on the record I would have been satisfied, I would have been emotionally distraught even. I mean, the production on this, and the way it raw’s down to end, is just so, that’s an almost perfect ending. I really needed Awsten breathlessly singing close to tears in my ears in that minimal tone.
“I got my space, but what did I pay for you?” // “I like you but I need some space.” [‘FUCK ABOUT IT (ft. blackbear)’, Intellectual Property].
‘CLOSER’ is a type of track we haven’t really seen since ‘Fandom’. Greatest Hit’s was an album of experimental progression and a deeper theatrical narrative to be told, which we can see the distinct development translated here. However, the previous record did little to nothing with bare-bones, acoustic songs, and thus ‘CLOSER’ becomes this sense of sentimental nostalgia that particularly pulls from earlier moments. This wasn’t done without recognition of that fact either. “People who get more nostalgic for my older kind of writing – maybe ‘Entertainment’-era. Not even older, just leaning on the more metaphorical, poetic side, I think that starting at the bridge of ‘Closer’, they are just gonna be fucking devastated.”
“Cause you’re the holiday I celebrate too late.” // “Happy birthday, Merry Christmas, to the one I call my missus.” [‘Lucky People’, Entertainment]. And, to quote my notes from when I listened to this song, “THERES A LUCKY PEOPLE PARALLE ARE YOU KIDDING ME IM IN SHOCK DEADASS AND HE SAID ENTERTAINMENT ERA FUCK YOU.” I’m not normal about this track.
“You’re the song that I loved but then overplayed.” // “I wanna live inside your mind next to your favourite songs.” [‘Take Her To The Moon’, Double Dare].
“I’m the B-side throwaway.” // “You’re a symphony, I’m just a sour note.” [‘Stupid For You’, Double Dare].
“I’ve been fucked so much that I no longer wait, I sabotage and break my own heart.” // [‘SELF-SABOTAGE’, Intellectual Property].
“I love you, or I want to.” // “I really like love. Or I think I really like love.” [‘You’d Be Paranoid Too If Everybody Was Out To Get You’, book by Awsten Knight, page 191].
Now, why I say almost perfect ending, that’s because I believe the way this LP concludes is the utter best way it could have.
A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH
“Now if I ever feel jealous (what), I just turn it into lyrics and I fuckin sell it.” // [‘Teenage Jealousy’, Demo Album].
Here we are, the final piece. Every single detail, aspect, and artistic foundation I’ve mentioned above in relation to sound, production, mixing, and throwing it into something that’s fundamentally an epilogue to this entire project is the definition of euphoria. I have repeated myself endlessly when I say parx creates tones that are so pretty and delicate, that they have this ability to balance something so sparkly and elegant with strong contrasting beats. The pitch here is faultless to me. This is the essential Waterparks album and this song fuses that together. The guitars 3/4 into it, the vocal distortion on “I ain’t jumping out the window”, to the references that allude to it – all of it is seamlessly perfect.
“Now I bleed lemonade.” // “I wanna drink your blood like it’s lemonade, lemonade.” [‘Lemonade’, Demo Album].
Much of this track references the past, and the previous tracks and almost ties them up. Which is a fun thing to think about when the previous LP, ‘Greatest Hits’, ends with the song ‘See You In In The Future’. “Desensitised, the love I get it’s virtual,” references and reinstates so much, especially even part of the concept of ‘Fandom’. And this makes sense when given the context that this song is so multi-faceted. “This song is kind of like, it’s almost like all of those. It’s like a Greatest Hits sort of thing or like a collection of, you know, a bunch of songs that people never got, put into one.”
“I ain’t jumpin out the window.” // “I might just lose my shit off of the balcony, room 103.” [‘You’d Be Paranoid Too (If Everybody Was Out To Get You)’, Greatest Hits]. This here specifically pairs with the ‘We Need To Talk’ music video, where Knight jumps off the balcony and kills himself, while also linking to the number 103 which is a recurring element across different types of media and social platforms.
‘A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH’ closes the track and thus the overall project with a reflective and evocative sample of an early Waterparks interview. This audio extract is dated back to a radio appearance with Mike Fish in 2015. It is once again pulling on this sentimental aspect of things, especially for those who have been around for a while, or, as Knight mentions, are nostalgic for earlier times. For myself, I cried, and then the track looped back around to ‘STARFUCKER’. Whirlpool of emotions, I keep saying it, but that’s what this project is, and that’s what it enforces you to feel.
“Once again, this is Waterparks.”
A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH
much more than an album
‘Intellectual Property’ is an insanely brilliant piece of art, an amalgamation of all the outstanding bits and pieces that Waterparks has offered you in the past, packaged meticulously in a total of 31 minutes and 4 seconds. This is the essential Waterparks album.
As I said earlier, “my favourite band dropped a new album”, which does of course mean I am a bit biased here. I have never not loved a parx LP. I would promote them so much at my high school. Recently, while talking to one of my best friends that I’ve known since eighth grade, he mentioned how he remembered me talking about “the hospital watermelon parking lot” and the “fanfic podcast” when those things happened. Being a Waterparks fan was my largest hyperfixation in high school, and I’m mentioning this to say while I’m about to say that ‘Intellectual Property’ is a masterpiece, I am highly chauvinistic.
I love art, I love to analyse something, and I love things that are not surface-level pretty. ‘Intellectual Property’ does all of this and more. I thought ‘Greatest Hits’ was insane, the more I returned the more I learnt, and for some reason, I didn’t think they could beat what that album did.
Elevation is the word that comes to mind here. Transcend. Amplification. Throughout the past four albums, Waterparks have learnt and developed the perfect intrinsic resolution of curating art.
Every single era, as they are often referred to, is fashioned within a window of repeating concepts. Such as the dedication to colour, theme, and even the alphabetic nature of their project titles. That in no way means Waterparks is confined to their own rules or goes without ‘breaking’ them, as was purposely reminded here following ‘Greatest Hits’. Technically, IP should have been H, since the EP ‘Airplane Conversations’ wasn’t followed up with the letter D. Instead, the next EP released was ‘Black Light’, and after that, it was not M, but the letter C for ‘Cluster’.
Collectively, this is a project about religious trauma, mental constraints and the un-comfortability within one’s self and others. There is this element that I found interesting and wanted to share. It’s not unknown that Knight’s religious expression turned towards more Universe and Spiritual esc nature:
“Zack: When did you stop praying?
Awsten: Oh, Mom if you’re watching this turn it off. Um, no, um I don’t know. Like I think it just kind of shifted more, so, to like the universe or something…you know what I mean like some like Law of Attraction type stuff.”
Awsten Knight | Waterparks, Intellectual Property, Otto, My Chemical Romance, 2023, Zack Zang Show
There are many different facets and layers to this, of course, and throughout little things like psychics, and paranormal exploration and interest that Knight has shared before. This is an interesting detail because the opening to IP ‘STARFUCKER’, shares lyrics such as: “Jesus Christ won’t text me back” to “It’s nice to meet you (What you give out’s what you get back) / (That’s the law of attract—). Which by itself is still a cool little detail on an album so crafted around religious guilt and the relationship with that. However, what makes this even more of a possibly (more than likely) intentional choice is the fact the closing track ‘A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH’ replicates, and thus, instils this point. “Now Jesus hates my guts, it’s gettin’ personal (Yeah)” to “Born January 17th, I’m overthinkin’ everything a Capricorn with double horns like triple six…”
You can look at this through the lens of furthering that disconnect with God, especially given the context that the symbol of Capricorn is a goat which is through many different religious looks tied to the Devil, paired with the mentioning of horns and triple six. Although, to deepen this, is simply by mentioning astrology in general. This isn’t to say that Awsten per se would be/is into that, I’m not making claims on his behalf. But what it is is a part of the same realm of this law of attraction, the manifestation ideas. Add that both ‘STARFUCKER’ and ‘A NIGHT OUT ON EARTH’ on different ends of the album do this structure is really just tying these little pieces together.
Knight can’t help but accept that he is meant to be unapologetic. “At the end of the day, I’d rather make the coolest fucking thing, rather than hold back and make something that wasn’t that good.”
ALTPRESS: How Waterparks’ wildly eclectic INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY turns into a love story, 2023
I could write for days about the multi-dimensions within this record, how represented I feel when I listen to it as another ADHD, somewhat insane creative. I probably won’t stop finding little details that add to the gripping account of the labyrinth of human emotions and desires constructed. Ultimately, though, is that not what makes good art?
“I’m dying to give you a show,” and quite literally this is what IP does. It is show-stopping, it is performance art, it is a spectacle. “Intellectual property is the mental space you give to something in your head. The ‘property’ may be the thing that you are struggling with. By materializing it and giving it its own world, it’s actually a great way to express it and then, eventually, expel it,” he explains. “I want this album to go to the fucking moon.” It is more than safe to say, with their first top ten album in the U.K, and one of the most successful pieces they’ve put out that Waterparks have more than achieved that. Because, overall, Waterparks know how to create something larger than life itself, something detailed and projecting intricate rhythmic arrangements in their world of unstructured visual and mental stimuli.
“It’s been a pleasure.”
STARFUCKER
Tangled In The Great Escape 