Look at that cover art. Look at it! It's fucking awesome! That's the cover of Johnny's Dreamworld, the debut album from the London band Modern Woman. It's an arresting glimpse of something fucked-up, and that's also pretty much the aesthetic of the band's very good new single "Dashboard Mary."
Modern Woman started out as a solo project from main songwriter Sophie Harris, and it gradually grew into a full-on four-piece band. Modern Woman's debut EP Dogs Fighting In My Dream came out in 2021, and we posted their subsequent singles "Ford" and "Achtung." Those two songs don't appear on Johnny's Dreamworld, the new album that the band recorded with producer Joel Burton. So you might as well start with "Dashboard Mary," an intense, slow-building reverie that really shows what Harris can do. Her voice is huge and expressive, and she brings a fiery sense of dynamics to the cathartic, orchestral rise. By the time the track reaches its raging finale, Modern Woman don't sound like a baby band anymore.
In a press release, Sophie Harris says, "This is a song that I wanted to write like a film. I wanted to confront the feeling of the ‘morning after’ and the decisions made during that time of exhilaration the night before." The music video definitely plays out like a film. It's an evocative and genuinely unsettling series of vignettes, in which Harris keeps running across creepy masked motherfuckers. Below, check out the video, the Johnny's Dreamworld tracklist, and Modern Woman's upcoming tour dates with Ezra Furman.
TRACKLIST:
01 "Johnny’s Dreamworld"
02 "Neptune Girl"
03 "Offerings"
04 "Killing A Dog"
05 "Daniel"
06 "Fork / Heart"
07 "Blessed Day"
08 "Dashboard Mary"
09 "The Garden"
TOUR DATES:
1/19 - Vienna, Austria @ Arena Wien *
1/20 - Graz, Austria @ Dom Im Berg *
1/21- Linz, Austria @ Posthof *
1/22 - Munich, Germany @ Technikum *
1/24 - Prague, Czech Republic @ Cargo Gallery *
1/25 - Berlin, Germany @ Columbia Theater *
1/26 - Hamburg, Germany @ Molotow *
1/27 - Amsterdam, Netherlands @ Paradiso Tollhuisten *
1/28 - Antwerp, Germany @ Trix Club *
1/29 - Paris, France @ Le Cabaret Sauvage *
2/01 - Glasgow, UK @ The Art School *
2/02 - Manchester, UK @ New Century Hall *
2/03 - Bristol, UK @ Electric Bristol *
2/04 - London, UK @ O2 Forum Kentish Town *
* with Ezra Furman
Johnny's Dreamworld is out 5/1 on One Little Independent Records. Pre-order it here.
