Wisp: A Wave of Shoegaze Hits the Bay
By Isaac Ortiz Dominguez
Wisp, a 19-year-old artist from San Francisco, is taking the alternative scene by storm with a melancholic drone spiral. With growing virality from platforms like TikTok and Instagram, she’s growing monumentally with her shoegaze sounds.
Within the last year, I’ve noticed a trend of Shoegaze songs blowing up on social media. Songs like Scars by Novulent, Blank by Glare, Leave Me Behind (alt version), and Your Face by Wisp see a skyrocketing of streams due to a sect of meme culture using the power of shoegaze to enhance their posts.
Other moody and ethereal songs are being rediscovered by a new generation of music listeners. Songs like Sex Tape by Deftone are given a new life by meme culture. Another song totally revitalized by memes is Duster’s Me and the Birds, initially released on August 22, 2000.
Natalie R. Lu, also known as Wisp, has graced the platform with her waves of distortion and euphoric voice. She stands out as a prospect in the new age of the Shoegaze renaissance.
In the U.S., shoegazer is taking over as a new staple in new indie music, except they hold a sort of bravado not typical of the big Shoegaze bands. She played at Outside Lands this year, and a clip uploaded on her YouTube channel shows her playing her single Enough For You.
Enough For You has been my favorite song from her so far, with a driving droning guitar, her edgy lyrics possess you in a heavenly state. “Why can you need me like I need you?” might not seem captivating on its own, but accompanied by her ensemble of guitar tones, it adds layers of waves crashing down on you.
Despite not having an official album yet, Wisp has released a strong EP and very exciting singles. She blends the strongest attributes of each shoegaze band before her and makes it her own: heavenly vocals, trance-like lyrics, heavy distortion, reverb, and a layer of delay.
Her most streamed song You’re Face with over 80,000,000 streams on Spotify stands out as a staple in the new generation of Shoegazers. Her sentimental lyrics, whispered voice and wall of distortion pour out like a waterfall or the fog of the Bay Area.
Mimi is a single that fools you at the beginning, reminding me of a song of Slowdive’s Pygmalion and then this tsunami of distortion overwhelms you and her lyrics give me goosebumps! “Beneath your neck that captivates and leaves me wanting more.”
Wisp stands out in the history of San Francisco’s latest talents; she seems to be akin to other bands based out of San Francisco like Sweet Trip and Red House Painter.
Pandora, a six-song EP fleshes out her limbo-esque sound, with sentimental songs of romantic obsession, yearning, and romanticism. It may get repetitive if she doesn’t evolve lyrically, but her sound is impeccable for this early in her career and life.
Once then we’ll be free stands out as a track that sonically and lyrically gets her out of her repetitiveness. She’s not too heavy on the distortion and leaves the drums and bass to breathe.
It feels faster-paced compared to her other songs and the guitar is slicker and just due to the distortion not being so thick. The bass is fun too, bouncing off her vocals and propelling the song between verse and chorus.