late night drive home have never known a world without internet — without access to the endless stream of joy, sorrow, and titillation that we all tune in and tune out to on the daily. In many ways, the guys can’t extricate themselves from that reality, but they’re trying to grapple with it. The culmination of that, then, is the buoyant yet ominous as I watch my life online, the band’s debut album on Epitaph. “The record is a critique and a meta representation of the current online landscape: a whole new world or giant united country that connects us between cities, forcing us to be online. Instant gratification is at our fingertips — likes, follows, and entertainment a click away,” says guitarist Juan “Ockz” Vargas. “It shows the listener how we grew up in the early days of peak internet — how we saw it all unfold. We want to give our perspective on the internet while creating art alongside it.” late night drive home was born in El Paso, Texas, and Chaparral, New Mexico, hardworking communities where the collars were mostly blue — a quality that the band would bring to their music as self-taught craftsmen. Comprising guitarist Juan “Ockz” Vargas, singer Andre Portillo, drummer Brian Dolan, and bassist Freddy Baca, the entirely self-taught quartet released their first EP as a full band, 2021’s Am I sinking or Am I swimming?, and blew up with the single “Stress Relief,” a blast of early-Aughts indie that racked in tens of millions of streams. Their first pull compilation of songs, How Are We Feeling? dropped in 2022, and after signing with Epitaph in 2023 — and releasing 2024’s grunge-inspired EP I'll remember you for the same feeling you gave me as i slept — they found themselves playing stages their indie idols previously shredded: Coachella, Shaky Knees, Austin City Limits, and Kilby Block Party. Since the end of the pandemic, though, the band has been dreaming up as I watch my life online. “Sonically the record is expertly produced — it was the first work we put out that was recorded in professional studios and not our bedrooms,” Vargas says about working with producer Sonny Diperri. “Topically, the album is about the internet. As a Gen-Z band, we want to give an accurate representation of how it feels to be always online. Our generation is forced to care so much about its online identity, it’s like ‘your profile is as important as your outfit.’” The resulting suite of tracks is a series of online vignettes that hammers home the band’s message: the photos on your phone shouldn’t be your identity; your posts aren’t your inner monologue.
MAGNOLIA PARK have never been ones to settle for subtlety. Since forming in 2018, the Orlando, Florida-based quintet have, over and over again, proven themselves to be one of the most exciting and forward-thinking groups in the underground, spinning a chameleonic, genre-spanning sound that incorporates punk, rock, pop, hip-hop and metalcore into a dizzying, multisensory experience. Blazing onto the scene with an insatiable social media work ethic and prolific musical output, their popular Halloween mixtapes, multi-part Eater EP series and full-length debut, Baku’s Revenge, cemented them not only as a playlist and For You Page favorite for millions of listeners around the world, but a must-see live act on tour with Simple Plan, Sum 41, A Day To Remember and the inaugural Summer School tour (where they served as a headliner), as well as major festivals like Reading and Leeds, When We Were Young, Sonic Temple and Welcome To Rockville. Now, Magnolia Park – vocalist Joshua Roberts, guitarists Tristan Torres and Freddie Criales, drummer Joe Horsham and bassist Vincent Ernst – are set to unleash their most ambitious effort yet: VAMP (Epitaph Records), a neo-gothic concept album rich in world-building and gripping storytelling. Culling influence from the band’s favorite anime including the long-running Vampire Hunter D, along with inspiration from iconic works like Star Wars, Dracula and Joseph Cambell’s legendary monomyth, Vamp unravels an ominous journey through Nocturne Nexus, where rulers and rebels battle with the future hanging in the balance.