Since 2018, King Whisker has been an anomaly in the California music scene, finding moments of substantial success yet primarily existing in DIY obscurity. Over a series of lineup changes, indie releases, and DIY music videos, King Whisker has played sold-out shows with bands like Yard Act and Post Sex Nachos, packed the world-famous Casbah, been guests of Los Irreverentes at the Black Box in Tijuana, received national radio play, been named a 91X San Diego artist of the month, and received three San Diego Music Award nominations including best Indie/Alternative artist. The band will release their first proper studio album in 2024, to be recorded at San Diego’s Amplified Studios.
The idea of a utopia looks different to everyone, and for King Whisker, it is a land of heavy riffs and chaotic tones. The band’s new single, “Utopia,” has them tapping into the bustling post-punk scene while intertwining it with their refreshing perspective. For the band, the world we’re living in is all but finished. Like any great band, they pull from the world around them, but rather than taking things at face value, they dig deeper to find the hidden beauty of what could be. Despite all of that, “Utopia” still sounds modern and present. King Whisker looks at the contemporary post-punk scene as something to be involved in, not borrow from. The band filters the tropes of the genre through their unique perspective, making “Utopia” a must-listen for anyone who says they’re a fan of any post-punk era.
“We met a bunch of members of the IDLES fan group (AFGang) when we opened for Yard Act last year. The AFGang people and the band itself had a profound impact on our sound. We started challenging ourselves to write more personal, self-reflective music,” explains the band. “We saw how people gravitated towards a band that really put its soul out there, and we knew we wanted to create our own little community where people could safely explore the fucked up world we find ourselves in. Utopia is a product of that journey. The song is—really—about us opening our eyes to a lot of the things that we’ve been hiding from. Maybe we’re ripping the Bandaid off with this one? The song isn’t a closed loop. The world isn’t a closed loop, and we don’t have any answers, but we still want to dance and dream and find beauty along the way.”
