Toronto instrumental sextet Lavender Town have released a new single, Starman Jr., out now on all major streaming platforms. The track arrives on the back of a run of sold-out headline shows at Lee’s Palace, The Great Hall and The Garrison, plus festival slots at the Toronto Jazz Festival, MixTO and Wavelength.
Formed by a group of formally trained jazz musicians, Lavender Town deliberately sidestep the usual fusion playbook. There are no funk grooves holding the floor here. In their place sit the abrasive textures of progressive rock, hard-hitting rhythms and the kind of high-voltage improvisation that only happens when players trust each other enough to jump without a net. Starman Jr. is the darkest and punchiest thing they have put out.
Bandleader and saxophonist Lazar Miric has been unusually specific about where the song came from, and the list of reference points is worth reading in full:
“I wrote Starman Jr. at a time when I was listening to a lot of the work of Vocaloid producer Jin and the LA modern jazz group Outside World. The way that both these artists combined catchy melodies with modern jazz harmony and a noisy rock and electronic aesthetic spoke to me on a deeply personal level. Most lyric-centered pop/rock leaves me wanting more musical complexity, and a lot of modern jazz lacks the emotional character and relatability that pop-leaning music brings, so a big goal of mine is to write music that accomplishes both.”
Lazar Miric
The title is a deep cut for a particular kind of listener. The Starman is an enemy from Earthbound, the cult-classic JRPG whose offbeat humour went on to shape Toby Fox’s Undertale, and Miric cites both games as compositional touchstones. He describes the verse as chasing the energetic, optimistic charge of anime intro music, while the chorus drifts somewhere between moody indie rock and the spiritual jazz of John Coltrane’s “Naima”. That is a lot of ground for one song to cover, which is rather the point.
For a band working this far outside any single lane, the shortest useful description might be the one the band themselves offer: music sitting squarely at the collision point of rock-forward aggression, complex jazz harmony and electronic production. If that combination sounds like it should not hold together, go and listen, because it does.
Listen to Starman Jr. here: linktr.ee/starmanjunior
Lavender Town line-up
- Lazar Miric – saxophone
- Kae Murphy – trumpet and EVI
- Luan Phung – guitar
- Jen Lo – synth and piano
- PT Sandberg – bass guitar and synth bass
- Ambrose Veno – drums
For fans of: Mandy, Indiana; Machine Girl; Hakushi Hasegawa; Toby Fox; Henry Solomon; Kneebody
Lavender Town online: Website | Instagram | YouTube | TikTok
