Poppongene flips the anguish of a break-up into spirited indie-pop music
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20.07.2020

Poppongene flips the anguish of a break-up into spirited indie-pop music

Image by Zoe Eley
WORDS BY AUGUSTUS WELBY

Poppongene’s Sophie Treloar joins us for episode 11 of the Turning Heads podcast.

Turning heads episode 11 features a conversation with Melbourne-based indie pop musician Poppongene, aka Sophie Treloar. Poppongene’s debut EP, Futures Unsure, came out at the beginning of July via Our Golden Friend.

Treloar has been operating under the Poppongene banner for the last four years, debuting with the singles ‘Do It Girl’ and ‘Belgravey’ back in 2016. However, she stalled on releasing an EP as she wanted more time to develop the sound and figure out what Poppongene would be.

The first taste of Futures Unsure was the single ‘Not Wrong’, which arrived in mid-2019. Like the rest of the EP, it was produced by Tim Harvey, who’s a member of Jade Imagine and has worked on records by the likes of Gena Rose Bruce and Taylah Carroll.

Treloar and Harvey established a strong creative synergy and crafted the eight-song release during the latter half of 2019, with help from Gemma Helms (bass), Deanna Rumsaviche (keyboard, backing vocals) and Damien Meoli (drums, percussion).

Futures Unsure was inspired by a break-up, but Treloar’s not one to wallow in misery. The EP consists of eight song’s worth of spirited indie pop with an aberrant inclination – Treloar and Harvey don’t always take the most logical route from A to B. In this respect, the record’s reminiscent of artists like Deradoorian, Melody’s Echo Chamber, The Shins and Broken Social Scene.

For the podcast, we spoke about the development of Poppongene’s artistic identity and Sophie’s desire to distinguish herself from Sunbeam Sound Machine, a project she’s performed with for many years. We also spoke about Melbourne’s rich music community and Sophie’s creative partnership with Tim.

Check out the podcast episode below:

I will be back with a new episode of Turning Heads next week. You can find the podcast on SpotifyPodbean and through Apple.

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