Dream Wife: So When You Gonna...
London-based trio Dream Wife – Alice Go, Bella Podpadec and Rakel Mjöll – released their self-titled debut in 2018 to critical acclaim, earning support slots with the likes of Garbage, Sleigh Bells and The Kills, sold-out international headline shows, secured syncs in shows like Orange is The New Black, all the while using their platform to lift up other womxn and non-binary creatives with empowering messages and their “girls to the front” ethos. Now, the band announces their explosive second album, So When You Gonna…, dealing with topics such as abortion, miscarriage, and gender equality, and produced entirely by a non-male team of producer and mixer Marta Salogni (Björk, Holly Herndon, FKA Twigs), engineer Grace Banks (David Wrench, Marika Hackman) and mastering engineer Heba Kadry (Princess Nokia, Alex G, Beach House). While it touches on important themes, there’s also an immediacy, a ‘now or never’ excitement that exists right at the core of this record, that encourages you to stop waiting and start doing. The album title is a play on that central idea. “It’s an invitation, a challenge, a call to action,” says Mjöll. So When You Gonna… will be released on July 3rd – pre-order HERE.
Dream Wife have always been outspoken about holding up other womxn and non-binary people in the creative industries, but these aren’t just words or sentiments. With a gender divide in music production currently estimated at around ninety-five percent male to five percent female, the band have– as they say in “Sports!” –“put their money where their mouth is”. It’s not just about working with a community of people they respect, it’s about encouraging the next generation of creatives, too. Which is why So When You Gonna… is also the name of Dream Wife’s new podcast series. Each episode is a one-on-one interview with a different creative about how exactly they managed to hone their craft, for example So When You Gonna… Get Into Production. “It’s an informative thing to feed back to our fans to be able to see about getting into certain industries. It’s about fostering communities. And it’s a skill share,” explains Go.
“It was amazing to work with this community of womxn on this album who are supporting each other in an industry that is so male-dominated. It was a way of us practicing what we preach. It felt like an honour to be able to deliver this baby with these three amazing midwives,” says Go. Podpadec adds, “What would you call the opposite of gate-keeping? Facilitator? Enabler? It’s all about opening the gates.”
