Childhood – Californian Light [Video]

Childhood announce the release of their highly-anticipated second album Universal High through Marathon Artists on July 21st. The London band have shared a video for lead single “Californian Light” which debuted via FADER today describing the sound “soul infused psych-pop.”  Childhood’s Ben Romans-Hopscraft explains “ironically, the sentiment of ‘Californian Light,’ has nothing to do with the sunshine state at all.  It was written as an ode to my relationships that define me as a person in London.”

Recorded at Maze Studios, Atlanta across the summer of 2016 where the band decamped for a month, it was produced by the legendary Ben H Allen III (Gnarls Barkley, Animal Collective, Deerhunter) who struck up quite the creative partnership with ringleader Ben Romans-Hopscraft. You could be forgiven for branding Universal High a rebirth. In places almost unrecognizable from the dub-charged psychedelic indie of their debut, the new sound swells from the southern streets in which it came to life, caked in the Seventies soul of The Isley Brothers, Curtis Mayfield and Shuggie Otis.

Ben Romans-Hopcraft says, “Universal High represents many things to us as a band. It signifies change, both musically and mentally whilst also revisiting influences that confounded our interest in music in the first place. What I think is noticeable is the direct nature of the songs and its influences. Being surrounded by soul music, classic pop songs and music with any form of groove all my life, these influences began to speak for themselves within these new songs we were writing”.