Arriving early to browse some new release vinyl before seeing Colleen Green belt out tunes from her latest LP, Sock it to Me, I found myself pushing through a crowd at Origami Vinyl, a crowd as eclectic as the various strands of marijuana consumed by Colleen while touring with a group that includes her mysterious single-named beatnik partner in crime, ‘Marisa. ‘ While Colleen (guitar/drum machine) and Marisa (bass) prepared their concert above the staircase at Origami, which looks to be the second floor office turned makeshift stage, the crowd slowly began to gather to listen to Colleen’s lo-fi, doo-wop sound that is both charming, and surprisingly addictive. By the time Colleen began to fiddle with the BPM knob on her Yamaha RX-11 drum machine, with beatnik Marissa swaying back and forth in a seductive pre-show dance, Origami had turned into a virtual hotbox of tattooed music nerds and artsy girls, who couldn’t stop dancing to sugary boyfriend odes like “Only One” and “I Wanna Be Degraded.” The low-hanging pendant lights, vintage records, and spiral staircase created a laid-back and psychedelic ambiance for an artist who is just that: laid back, supremely talented, and perpetually stoned.
Hardly Art, who recently signed Colleen as their resident pop punk poet laureate (Ray-Ban sunglasses and all), has had Colleen performing at intimate venues for what’s going to be a six-week tour, which includes the gig at Origami. Describing Colleen’s sound as lo-fi pop-punk, loaded with fuzz guitar and groovy hooks inspired by bands like Nobunny, would be a lazy way of describing an artist that seems to have a sound that is textured through a melting pop of sounds from new-wave’ 80s dance melodies, doo-wop choruses reminiscent of The Ramones, and revealing lyrics that defy the generally transparent pop punk genre. To pigeonhole Colleen Green as “pop-punk” would be uninspiring and lazy. The truth is, Colleen’s sound is as eclectic as her artistic palate, which includes: drawing comics, hand-painting her own merchandise (i.e. t-shirts), writing all of her music, and consistently finding new ways to tell her story of heartache, isolation in the big city, and the “Heavy Shit” on her mind.
Colleen’s debut LP, Sock it to Me, is available now in all formats. It includes ten musical gems, her own custom art and drawings, and an album cover that includes Colleen staring at donuts. For updates on Colleen Green’s tour, you can visit her Hardly Art artist page to get updates here. She’s also all over Twitter.
