Rain’s Video for “Solis” Twins English New Romanticism with American Youth Culture

The UK is full of small labels run out of people’s bedrooms that are often the greatest treasure troves for new music, and Essex’s Close To Home is one of them. Their discography is concise and consistent, dealing mostly in the nebulous spectrums of lo-fi, indie, and punk that usually land on the bleak side—but not without a fight. The most recent addition to their roster is Rain, a four-piece from Swindon.

Surely, there cannot be a more fitting name for a Swindon-based band than “Rain.” Championed from BBC Radio 1 Rock Show’s Daniel P Carter all the way to Seattle’s KEXP, Rain have taken shoegaze formulas and twinned them with a hint of new romanticism. It’s the kind of stuff to kiss and cry to, quite frankly.

We’re premiering the video for “Solis”—the follow up to their debut EP Symphony Pains, out earlier this year—which you can watch below. We’re not sure where the footage is from, but it could easily be Pleasantville come to real life. This isn’t a sentence you hear every day, but there’s something weirdly soothing about watching 1950’s American teens swing dancing to shoegaze in a high school gym.

Catch Rain on the following dates across the UK (*w/ Gnarwolves, ^ w/ Elvis Depressedly):

28/5 – Dot To Dot Festival, Bristol
2/6 – New Cross Inn, London
9/6 – The Joiners, Southampton^
17/6 – Level 3, Swindon*
6/8 – Fieldview Festival

“Solis” will be released as a digital single on Friday, May 27. Syphony Pains is out now via Close To Home Records.