54•40 are crossing over to the sunny side of the street — and time-travelling back to the ’80s — in their new lyric video for Sublime Like Me, showcasing today on Tinnitist.
With its cool synths and speedy electro-pop groove, the latest single from the band’s most recent album Keep on Walking is something of a departure for the Vancouver veterans. Not to mention a nostalgic look back at their early influences, as they admit.
“Sublime Like Me is a love letter to the British Dark Wave bands of the ’80s that we love,” the band says in a statement. “The original demo of the song was fully formed and identical in arrangement to the finished master, but Gavin Brown’s production craftily modernized the track, while still nodding to its influences.”
Of course, they’ve been around just as long as those influences. The Canadian pop/rock luminaries were, established New Year’s Eve 1980 at Vancouver’s famed Smilin’ Buddha Cabaret, and have endured as writers of countless iconic, enduring, chart-topping gems, worshipped by millions at home in Canada and across the globe.
Legendary, indeed, and still insanely vital, not to mention consistently in-demand on marquee stages far and wide. Fittingly, as they near their 40th year as a band, 54•40’s Keep On Walking is their most eclectic, propulsive, flat-out excellent album in a career spilling over with them.
Featuring 11 original songs helmed by a quartet of superstar producers that would make a gear nerd quiver, Keep On Walking is a vivid snapshot of precisely where singer/guitarist Neil Osborne, bassist Brad Merritt, drummer Matt Johnson and guitarist Dave Genn — songwriters and multi-instrumentalists all — are right now: totally dialled in and seriously on fire.
Enjoy Sublime Like Me above, listen to the rest of Keep On Walking and check out their upcoming tour dates below, and keep up with 54•40 via their website, Facebook and Instagram.
54•40 Tour Dates
Sept. 6, 2019 | Maxwell’s Music House | Waterloo, Ont.
Sept. 7, 2019 | East Valley Days | Sudbury, Ont.
Oct. 11/12, 2019 | Commodore Ballroom | Vancouver. B.C.
Dec. 5-7, 2019 | Horseshoe | Toronto, Ont.
Jan. 11, 2020 | FirstOntario Arts Centre | Milton, Ont.
Jan. 12, 2020 | Performing Arts Centre | Burlington, Ont.
Jan. 14/15, 2020 | Dominion Telegraph Event Centre | Paris, Ont.
Jan. 18, 2020 | The Music Hall | Oshawa, Ont.
Jan. 19, 2020 | River Run Centre | Guelph, Ont.
