The fauna, the feels & Foliage
From the balconies of the heart — Foliage’s Manuel Joseph Walker; video photo still courtesy of Christopher Madrid.
The California dreaming concept in the world of music, and popular culture at large, spans for generations and years. Its a pursuit, the perpetual sport in trying to trap the ultimate essence of the pacific coast into the cola pop bottle of a singular artistic experience. The doe eyed family bands, the titans of the Troubadour, the influential sects and sovereign lords of the Sunset Strip, the Bay Area empire of impresarios, outsiders, provocateurs, cosmic sky captains, surfers living the proverbial search, the rhythms and moods from the metropolises, to the beautiful dreamers locked away in the safe confines of their room to conduct visionary symphonic sound suites to the mythological spirits in the sky. This brings us to the latest from San Bernardino based DIY institution Foliage, sharing samples of sun saturated auras of light in every ultra-melodic chime of sparkling jangle tone. The progressive post twee punk purveyors have firmly etched their emotively charged plush primitive imprint into the hall of Cali’s sea gazing saints and appears to be now finally receiving their much overdue flowers.
With the release of Foliage’s latest EP Throwaways, Manuel Joseph Walker heralds the upcoming sixth album with some of the artist’s most dazzling and mesmerizing work to date. Boasting a creative repertoire that spans a multitude of directions from encyclopedic DIY intonations, progressive rhythms, a compendium of the contemporary and modern pop classical, to increasingly elaborate textural touches — Foliage has risen to the prominence as one of the west coast’s most treasured polymaths. Elevating the platform of what bedroom recording can be, what emotive expressions can be captured in the worlds of audio arts, what depth and dimensions the power production can encompass, extoling what can materialize within the polarities of minimalism and maximalism alike.
Throwaways gently immerses you into the suburban pools of deep end diving thoughts with “Where in the Earth”. The punchy rhythm keeps the lavish silk strum daydream extravaganza in a tightly wound economy while beautifully blurring ever so slightly outside the track’s percussive guard rails. The mind drifting adventure of soul searching in the vastness of the bewildering world is conveyed like a day tripper’s afternoon odyssey. Manuel embraces a kind of gleeful abandon that is dedicated to fully living the life you want that is genuinely yours. An affirmation to do what you want to do and a commitment to living your truth and keeping it 100 in all that you say. “Earth” is a modern day dedication to realizing our purposes in the humble terrestrial places on this planet.
“Five Years Later” leans into the pangs of futuristic memories and the flickering romantic embers of lingering love. The song is arranged with the assuaging calm of a Japanese village core soundtrack where windy flute synths swish like the leaves in the branches of swaying tree brush. Foliage delivers a song with the heart of a sappy afterschool special in a spatial city pop format. The rush of finding a love that is lasting is relayed in all of it’s energy of completely overtaking enamourment. “Five” floats forward with an out of body experience where nostalgia for the present is projected ahead in the dreamy hopes for what dreams may manifest.
We recently had a chance to catch up with Foliage’s Manuel Joseph Walker in the following interview exchange:
Meditations on the salvageable substance and meaningful media that comprises Throwaways.
Throughout my career as Foliage, I've always taken a long time to produce records, as I'm a firm believer in "quality-over-quantity", but as I've aged, I've realized it's given me tunnel-vision a lot of the time and prevented me from releasing some really good songs. The idea for Throwaways came about when I realized just how much music I've been sitting on over the years, working on not only my next LP, but stuff I've made just for fun in-between, as well as future LP's and experimentation of sounds, genres, and production. In 2024 and onward, I want to release more music period, whether that's sole Foliage music, or the Foliage-produced backdrops for artists like Christoughfur & Terra Leon to name a few.
Notes on the latest breakthroughs in your own creative processes.
The biggest breakthrough I've made was taking a "problem-solver" approach to finishing tracks rather than forcing unfinished ideas. An untold story I'm sure any producer or musician alike reading this can attest to is that so many tracks and good ideas are made, only to be lost forever by judging an undeveloped idea too early as being wack or garbage. Had I not went back and sifted through these old projects I've made over time, this EP "Throwaways", and a lot of future stuff, as well as new stuff, probably would've never happened. "What?" was one of those songs. Shoutout my homie Stevie from Paradise Blossom for pushing me to release that one, since he really liked it even in its demo stage. Now it's one of my most popular (and newest) songs to date.
Reflections on what things are currently inspiring your own particular paths that contribute to your visions.
Honestly, I'm inspiring myself. I work really fuckin' hard, and have worked hard constantly for almost 10 years on Foliage. Only now am I finally starting to see the fruits of my labor, and I hope that only continues to grow from here on out.
That, and I have some really dope people I surround myself with. I keep my circle small, so y'all know who you are.
Further reflections on your praxis that fuses the primitive with something that is so lush and aspirational.
I'm honestly just living on this Earth. I can tell you how I made some of my classic records like III, Truths, Silence, Take etc. all day, but they're never gonna be the exact same. Each release and sonic palette is a moment in time.
It's cool going back and listening to those old records because you can still hear bits of that older stuff in my music now, or on the opposite end, how my sound would develop over time to what it is now. I acquired new gear over time, I got better at not only playing my instruments, singing, and writing more expressive songs, but most importantly becoming a better producer overall. I consider myself more of a producer than anything, even though fans or new listeners probably see me as a singing guitar player haha.
Overpasses, undertones, expressive exhibitions and Foliage’s Manuel Joseph Walker; video photo still courtesy of Christopher Madrid.
Goals and dreams for 2024.
Goals: Get rich.
Dreams: Free Jeffrey.
Shout outs to other creatives of import.
Man, there's so many that I love for different reasons but I'll try and narrow it down.
First and foremost, shoutout to Christoughfur, that man helped me to finally put out multiple hip-hop projects under the Foliage name, which is something I've always wanted to do due to my heroes J Dilla, Gang Starr, Griselda Records, Freddie Gibbs, and Kendrick Lamar to name a few. I never personally met a rapper who could spit fire the way he does. He inspired me to make crazy beats and productions which inspired new flows out of him, and that's what makes our unlikely duo so legendary: We inspire each other.
He's also a brilliant visual artist whether that's artwork, fashion, or videography. Christoughfur even filmed, directed, and edited both videos from this new project, "Where in the Earth" and "Five Years Later", all by himself.
Needless to say, we've got tons more music on the way.
Next is Paradise Blossom. It's crazy how short of a timeframe we've been homies, yet have become so close. I met them through a longtime homie and artist I love, High Sunn, on their various tours.
They're a fairly new band, yet have made a bunch of waves already in this "dream pop", "bedroom pop" (or whatever you wanna call it) scene, which is a testament to their hard work and great music.
Also, they are just the coolest, nicest guys ever, and I love every moment we've spent together. We actually have a collaboration song in the works together (yes, you heard it here first!), which hopefully will come out later this year.
Sunshy is another one, and they are one of my favorites out right now period. They're a Chicago-based duo, my longtime homie Wesley and his partner Sascha. They absolutely fuckin' rip, and I love every single song they've done.
Seriously, go listen to "Dissolve" right now, and try and tell me that's not a banger. I'm excited for what's next.
I'm sure an amazing record is on the way from them (hint, hint).
Next is Terra Leon, my best friend of 12+ years. Our whole friendship started because we were both massive music lovers, something that wasn't particularly a bond for anyone in our friend groups growing up. Seriously, we listened to everything! We also loved skateboarding and fashion, we got made fun of a lot for that in school but we never gave a fuck. We always knew we were going to achieve greatness. He's a very talented, creative person all around.
We've even co-produced some stuff and we're thinking of starting a separate duo outside of our solo projects.
We're sitting on tons of music together, which should be launching in the coming weeks.
Mononegatives, my Canadian brothers. I've said so much about these guys in real life but never through an interview or anything. I fuckin' love their music, and their latest LP "Crossing Visual Field" was one of my top records of 2023. Their ability to craft this angular punk and post-punk music with shoegaze and new-wave is so amazing and inspiring. I had the honor of touring with them in 2022 thanks to the label we're apart of, Dowd Records. We shared tons of laughs, music stories, a love for WWF/E/wrestling in general, and they taught us a bunch of Canadian slang. Can't wait to hack a dart with you hosers when we meet again.
My actual blood brother, NikkolikesFOOD. I'm so proud of him for rolling out some tunes finally. He's been sitting on music for forever too, but has been rolling out some great stuff lately not only with his solo project, but working with PVJ.amal to create their duo MADE IN A LAB, which featured on Christoughfur & Foliage's "Break a Bitch". I love you Nikko.
Okay, I don't wanna make this too lengthy, so here's just a few more with no explanations, they know why I love em:
TWINPERSONA, Drew Younker, Landcruiser, Bummer Daze, CITRUS (the best band in the world), and Daise. Hope i'm not missing anyone.
Parting words of wisdom and fascination.
Don’t ever fucking quit. If I listened to anyone that ever discouraged or shunned me from doing what I love, I wouldn't be here today. I would be dead.
This part's gonna sound real cliché, but stay real and keep a middle finger up for all the fake people in this world.
Foliage’s Throwaways is available now everywhere.