Bad Suns
The unlikely but undeniable success story being lived by Bad Suns seems nearly scripted, starting with a KROQ DJ finding their demo in a mailbox and giving it enough airplay to land the group on Conan and Kimmel. Other measures of success have already been met, including appearances at Coachella and opening slots for top shelf headliners such as Halsey and the 1975. A lengthy tour just kicked off overseas and runs through mid-May, including an April 3 date at Observatory North Park, all in support of their first album for major label Epitaph Records, Mystic Truth, which drops March 22. Things could go one of two ways.
They might finally establish a firm slot in the pantheon of anthemic arena rockers like U2 and Springsteen, or prove to be in the final throes of indie stardom before a major label dud sends them scattering to the wind like REM and San Diego’s own Origin. Lord knows the band has always secretly dreamed that you’ll mistake one of their songs for any of their oh-so-obvious platinum antecedents. Singles are streaming online for “Away We Go” and “Hold Your Fire,” both produced by Dave Sardy (Oasis, the Head and the Heart) with an ear toward a multigenerational mainstream likely to be left scratching their heads if told that Mystic Truth is named for a neon and glass sculpture spotted in a London museum by singer-guitarist Christo Bowman, or that one of the album’s inspirations is the supernatural farce The Master and Margarita by Russian novelist Mikhail Bulgakov.