EP Walkthrough: Christian Leave details his sensational new EP, Trilogy

When it comes to international, independent labels making a killing in Australia, it's hard to look past Godmode. The LA-based label has gone from strength to strength over the last two years, blossoming into a multi-faceted, multi-genre home to some of the underground's most acclaimed and exciting, from the thick, Korean-infused trip-house of Yaeji or the addictive groove of Channel Tres, both of which recently wrapping up applauded debut Australian shows. Their latest signing Christian Leave is more in-line with the soft indie of another of their signings, Shamir, with the LA-via-Texas musician using his latest EP Trilogy - his first release via Godmode - as a confident and seamless move into the mainstream.

Trilogy sees the 18-year-old ex-Vine star mature into an excellent songwriter worth paying attention to, combining subtle indie sounds and left-of-centre injections of synth and bass grooves with his hazy vocal, which when combined with its washed-out, DIY-esque shading, creates quite an enduring listen. The EP's lead single Never offers the most evidence of this powerful sound, with a thick drum beat meeting precise guitar melodies and playful synth underneath his woozy, almost King Krule-sounding vocal sway. "I made all of these songs sometime around June-Julyish of this year in my Airbnb living room," he says on the EP. "I had just moved out to LA away from home in Texas. I felt incredibly alone and like no one wanted to be around me, but also completely surrounded and overwhelmed. I felt like my life was really progressing in so many different directions so fast so I wrote these little love songs reflecting that."

If you're yet to be acquainted with Christian Leave, Trilogy offers the perfect entry point, so do so by listening to the EP below with a track-by-track walkthrough from the rising star himself. Be sure to keep an eye on him in 2019.

You

For me, You is sort of a love letter to LA in the sense that I knew I loved it here and that I had to move here but battling that love was the fear of leaving my parents for the first time, starting my own life, is everyone going to like me? Am I going to make it?! Please don’t tear me apart.

But at the bottom of everything, You is about knowing that you love someone but you’re unsure of how they love you.

Smaller

I was feeling really inadequate when I wrote Smaller, I had kind of come to terms with the fact that I would never really meet the expectations set by other people and that it was really unhealthy to try, and that's what the song is - it's just me accepting that fact and deciding to exceed all criteria for myself.

Understand

Understand is really just a sweet little love song about the acceptance of a knowing your second choice and being completely content with that idea.

Never

Never, to me, is probably the biggest timepiece of my life so far. I wrote it right after moving out and I was taking it hard. I was and still am missing my family more than you could imagine. We've always been such a tight family and none of us had ever really flown the coop so I was the first to go, so it was really a first for all of us.

I tried my best to communicate those emotions :)

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