Luna Honey

The sixth full-length album from Philadelphia-based dark-avant group Luna Honey in seven years, Bound is a genre-blending, pyretic journey to the extremes. Recorded in Philadelphia at Dan Angel’s In The Shadow of Boner Forever studio space as well as at band members’ home studios, Bound is being self-released November 22 on cassette, CD, digital download, and through streaming services.

Since their debut album Peace Will Grind You Down in 2018, the band, consisting of vocalist/guitarist Maura Pond, guitarist Benjamin Schurr, and bassist Levi Flack, has established a reputation as a bold, unflinchingly creative force. 

While Luna Honey performs live with Pond on vocals and tenor baritone guitar, Flack on bass and Schurr on guitar, Bound continues their history of exploration in the studio, with each member layering in textures and ghost melodies from a wide range of instruments and sound sources including an organ pipe from an abandoned church, dropped books, pitch-shifted kazoo, vibraphone, mandolin, sleigh bells, ukulele, synthesizers, etc. in addition to their regular instruments. Angel guested on drums on most tracks, and Roger Martinez makes an appearance on upright bass.

Bound threads the needle between the raucous absurdity of Parables (2022), the brooding emotionality of Ballast (2021), and the meditative reflections of longer-form compositions like Branches (2020) or Aftermath (2023).  Pond’s sibylline lyrics unfold like ten short stories containing moments of humor and vulnerability that shine through the darkness. “Vacuum Cleaner” is a brutal post-modern aria with hints of Flannery O’Connor that tackles technology, gender, and progress with searing vocals that float above a maelstrom of noise and feedback. On the second half of the album, tracks like “Hriddel” provide stark contrast with its lullaby minimalism and gauzy intimacy upheld by simple vocals paired with Rhodes piano. The title track is a haunted conjuration of a manic drumming circle held at the New Moon. All the songs on Bound are quite different from one another–a result of following the creative sparks wherever they may lead.

Birthed out of DC’s DIY scene in 2017, the band has played with artists such as Norman Westberg (Swans), Eric Hubel, Exploded View, Molly Nilsson, Abdu Ali, Martin Bisi, Buck Gooter, and hackedepicciotto (members of Einstuerzende Neubauten).

Luna Honey was originally formed in 2017 in Washington, DC by Maura Pond and Levi Flack who had informally begun playing together in Flack’s basement and set a goal to write an album’s worth of music. The pair met Benjamin Schurr (Ruah, Br’er, Nyxy Nyx), founder of BLIGHT.records, when his band Br’er opened a show for Arto Lindsay at the Black Cat and he soon after agreed to record and produce them. When they’d finished recording their debut album, Peace Will Grind You Down, Ben insisted that the pair begin performing live, agreed to fill in temporarily, then became a permanent member along with baritone sax player Madeline Billhimer. The four-piece line-up recorded Peace Lives, a live recording of songs mostly from their first album. Billhimer left the band during the recording of their next full-length album, Ballast.

Schurr, who was born in Philadelphia, moved back to his home city in 2019 with Flack following shortly after. Christmas Eve of 2019, Pond’s aunt shared she had months to live and asked her to write her some music to help accept her transition, asking that it could be released after her death. Still living in DC, Pond recruited Ben to come down to her house in Anacostia and record an intense week of highly improvised sessions. The two worked around the clock on what would become the fourth album Luna Honey, Branches. 

After the pandemic hit in 2020, Pond moved back to her hometown of Richmond, VA to be closer to her parents and Schurr followed. All three band members commuted back and forth between Richmond and Philadelphia continuing to write songs. Parables was written during the period of geographic separation across DC, Philadelphia, and Richmond. 

Three months after moving to Richmond, Pond’s mother passed after an over a decade long fight with cancer. In the wake of her mother’s passing, Pond had found comfort in the solo work of longtime Swans guitarist Norman Westberg and ended up striking up a long-distance collaboration. Aftermath resulted, a meditation on grief and what is left behind.

In 2022, Pond and Schurr moved to Philadelphia, finally reuniting the band within the same city. Re-energized after living through the difficulties during COVID and the past several years, the three began recording a new crop of songs that would make up the majority of Bound, with the goal of capturing the raw, powerful energy of their live shows.

Luna Honey’s art emerges from the creative tension between the death of the ego and the exploration of the subconscious with the pragmatism and discipline of punching the clock and getting the work done.