It’s a little ridiculous that I’m posting about a Hong Kong band from Hong Kong while said band is tooling around North America and will be in my town in a week and a half or so, but here we are. I’m talking, of course, about Lucid Express who released their second album Instant Comfort last month and instantly staked their position as not just the best dreampop band from Hong Kong, but one of the best new acts anywhere. I say this as someone who liked their 2021 self-titled debut well enough, but found it a little slight and wasn’t necessarily expecting great, great things with album number two.

But with this record, the band’s songwriting and sonic sculpting have both taken huge leaps forward. They understand that shoegaze and dreampop are different things, and are adept at balancing both for a record that shimmers where it wants to and roars when it needs. It does crush me more than a little that I won’t see them play Wavelength Festival next week, but take solace in having seen them last Spring in Los Angeles.

They’ve been doing some press for the record and discussed making the video for album opener “Promise Me” early on in sessions for the record during Chinese New Year celebrations:

What challenges did you run into while making the “Promise Me” video with Neo Yeung? What was the mood like on set?

This video was actually the first thing we finished for the album and was, coincidentally, shot during Chinese New Year, which just happened again this week. There are a lot of social and familial obligations that come with this time of year, so just managing to get the five of us together was really challenging. That’s why we ended up shooting for so many hours — we really wanted to make the most of the time we had together.

Lucid Express’ “Promise Me” is a shimmering all-night grind @ Alternative Press

Japanese shoegaze blog Sleep Like A Pillow also has an interview, presumably conducted in Cantonese, translated and posted in Japanese, and readable in English through the magic of science. Will something be lost in translation? Almost certainly.

Lucid Express Interview: Relaxing Music Pursued With Stoicism @ Sleep Like A Pillow

And it’s not an interview, but the feature review accompanying their being declared Bandcamp’s Album Of The Day is a worthy read:

Album Of The Day: Lucid Express, “Instant Comfort” @ Bandcamp