Grey Glass and The Solarists To Release New Music at Dual EP Release Show

_{By Zach Collier}

Tomorrow the bands Grey Glass and The Solarists will each release EP’s at a dual EP release show at Velour Live Music Gallery in downtown Provo. Grey Glass is an established local act whose lead singer, Tal Haslam, was recently one of four finalists in KSL’s talent competition, The Utah Voice. The Solarists are a newer act whose music has found an audience after free shows at The Garage and a stellar performance during a preliminary round of Velour’s 2016 Summer Battle of the Bands. Grey Glass will release their EP Colorblind, while The Solarists will be releasing their EP Strange Love.

“‘Colorblind’ is the first track on the EP, written about giving up what you have now for an uncertain future,” says Grey Glass drummer Scott Knutson. We shed a lot of our old roots genre-wise on this album, so the title felt fitting as a theme for the whole album.” The band’s sound has previously been compared to acts like Savage Garden and John Mayer, which “either makes us laugh or hurts our feelings, depending on how self-conscious we happen to be feeling,” laughs Knutson.

Now, the band is taking things in a new, more mature direction. “If you look through a grey piece of glass, it’s like you’re colorblind. In fact, that concept is why we called our band Grey Glass in the first place: every single one of us perceives the world/reality differently, as if we have different colors of glass in front of our eyes. Music can do that as well. It can change how you see and feel the world around us. We hope our music accomplishes that too.” The band wants their music to feel like a blend of Northwest Washington and the California Coast, and evoke images of the same.

The Solarists’ new EP is a collection of songs the band has been performing since they formed in October, 2015. “A lot of the songs are about loving something you can’t have, growing old with ones you love, knowing something won’t last long and coming to terms with everything ending just fine in the end,” says lead singer Clint Purser. The band’s music sits somewhere between pop and indie rock. They try to dig deep both sonically and emotionally, while still remaining accessible to listeners.

The bands have played several shows together, the first of which being the Goosenecks Music Festival kick-off concert. “I knew they were working on their EP, and we’ve been working on ours,” says Purser. “They invited us to open for them at their EP release show right when I was booking the date for ours. Instead of playing two seperate shows and competing with each other to bring bigger crowds, I thought it would be a good idea to come together and try to make it as big as possible. Music isn’t about competition, it’s about bringing people together.”

“We are friends, and The Solarists are just solid guys,” adds Knutson. “They bring a lot of positive energy to any show or event they coordinate and have phenomenal music.”

The show is tomorrow, July 29th at Velour Live Music Gallery. Velour 2016 Summer Battle of the Bands finalists Motion Coaster will be opening for both bands. Tickets are available online at 24tix.com for $7. Tickets at the door are also $7 (cash only). Doors open at 8PM. Make sure to like both Grey Glass and The Solarists on Facebook, check out their concert promo video below, and bring money for some fresh new merch.