Harms is the brainchild of Jake Harms who took a hiatus from his other band, What Moon Things, to create the highly personal debut album Aquarium. His emotionally loaded, forlorn musings evoke late ’80s gothic rock, particularly the work of The Cure and Echo and the Bunnymen.
“Car Outside” is the kind of unrequited love song that feels so unbearably lonely, it becomes comforting. Jake’s dire indie pop yarns are spun out over a hypnotic, tape saturated back beat, couched in a bed of jangling, angular acoustic guitars. The sound is pressurized yet languid, making me feel the album’s title, Aquarium, is more of an overall mood than a physical reference to a particular location.
“In the end, as an artist, I’m always hoping that people accept my broken shit and that it resonates and makes people feel closer to the vulnerable parts of themselves,” Harms reflects. Indeed, the vulnerability of his tunes makes for a perfect self-reflective soundtrack and offers an incredibly insightful glimpse into a much less-guarded artistic vision then we are used to hearing from the indie rock world.
