DUST BOWL FAERIES Remind Of Love’s Uncertainty With Sinister New Clip For “Cyanide Hotel”

“There are no waters of the sea as deep and marvelous as Ryder Cooley.” – INSTINCT MAGAZINE

“A faerie-tale fusion of dark cabaret, gothic polka and post-punk music.” – WGXC-FM Wave Farm

Hudson Valley, NY Purveyors of Cabaret-Noir

Remind of Love’s Uncertainty with
Beguiling John Huba-Directed Clip for “Cyanide Hotel”

New Carnival Dust EP Out NOW

FEBRUARY 13, 2023 (Hudson Valley, NY) — If February is truly a month that celebrates love of all kinds, it wouldn’t be complete without acknowledging the unknowing that surrounds love’s pursuit. After all, isn’t that what most of us end up contemplating on the precipice of a new tryst? Dust Bowl Faeries celebrate love’s mysterious pull with a brand new video clip for “Cyanide Hotel,” directed by celebrated Hudson Valley cinematographer John Huba, which releases today.

“Cyanide Hotel” zeroes in on a frustrating facet of the human condition: we want to know the ending before we start. We want to measure the cost. And yet, if we could truly calculate love’s outcome, we’d never take that leap. But we often do take the leap despite knowing that things might not end well. We take the leap even though we might end up at the Cyanide Hotel. 

“It’s a song about a place you don’t want to take a date, especially on Valentines Day,” cautions Ryder Cooley, the singer, songwriter, accordion player, and bandleader for the New York-based, vaudeville-inspired indie collective. “The garden was once a cemetery, now it’s growing tall with cotton weeds. A sinister feeling lurks in this haunted ghost hotel.”

“The video is romantic and devilish, playful and foreboding,” she continues, framing the viewer’s dilemma. “Should you follow this pixie into the forest and down the stone path to her elven cave and woodsy dream circus? Watch out, this devious creature may be a siren, disorienting you and leading you astray with her mischievous songs and fluttery eyelashes!”   

Huba’s clip for “Cyanide Hotel” puts a fresh spin on a previous track, resurrecting a deep cut from Dust Bowl Faeries’ 2020 set The Plague Garden and presenting it in a new context. Huba tells us, “I met Ryder at a gig at the Colony in Woodstock,” a venue that Dust Bow Faeries will return to on March 30 – tickets here. “I immediately saw her in my head as a dark and mysterious faerie wandering the countryside. Next thing I knew, we were on a mountaintop with a ram named Hazel filming a video for her song “Cyanide Hotel.” This town seems to specialize in serendipity.”

The new clip is yet another chapter in Dust Bowl Faeries’ commitment to maintaining an ongoing cinematic element to their music, something on full display in their epic “Lost in Time” video, directed by filmmaker Lisa M. Thomas (Thin Edge Films), out last fall. Even the lyric video for their most recent single, “The Changeling,” is rife with riveting stills.   Uncertain or doomed love isn’t the only kind on Ryder’s mind during Cupid’s season this year. She’s also focused on her love of animals. A staunch vegan and animal activist, love for our animal brethren is something that’s always at the forefront of her thinking, but especially so during this time of year when so many of us are hung up on being alone. Let’s not discount what animals bring to our lives.

“I’ve felt a kinship to animals for as long as I can remember,” she tells us. “There are literally baby pictures of me and our family dog Diané – a boxer/pit – sleeping next to each other on the floor, as if we were the same species. Animals understand me better than most people do.” Nowadays Ryder communes with her spirit animal Hazel (the taxidermy ram featured in the “Cyanide Hotel” video). She’s also a certified “cat lady” and works with local animal rescues in the NY Hudson Valley.  

Upon it’s release, The Plague Garden met with much critical acclaim, likening the band’s sound to a “freewheeling carnival set up on the outskirts of a small town,” by Rock and Roll Globe and as a “carnival of beguiling delights, ready to whirl you around the dancefloor of your mind” by Audiofemme. 

The new Carnival Dust EP finds the band diving into explorations of goth, rock, cabaret, vaudeville, and folk through the lens of surviving a pandemic that ended public performance as we once knew it. Accompanied by her rapturous accordion in the opening track “Cuckoo,” Ryder leads the band in a balladic tale that recalls the gypsy punk of Gogol Bordello and dark carnival roundelays of Emilie Autumn.

With the haunting tones of the musical saw and Mikaela Davis‘ harp adding an eerie edge to “The Changeling,” Dust Bowl Faeries adds a propulsive doo-wop sensibility to its infectious chorus. The torchy rustic quality of “Clockwork Romance” channels a blusier tone, courtesy of the whiskey-soaked rasp of Rocket Faerie (a.k.a. Jon B. Woodin).

Starting in 2015 as an all-woman trio, Dust Bowl Faeries is committed to working with as many women-identified musicians and artists as possible, including their collaborative filmmaker Lisa M. Thomas (Thin Edge Films) who documents and adds visual flair to the band’s unique and arresting visuals. Now a multi-gendered band, they have released two EPs (2018’s The Dark Ride Mixes and 2019’s Beloved Monster) and a self-titled debut (produced by music critic Seth Rogovoy and featuring Tommy Stinson of The Replacements and Melora Creager of Rasputina). Their 2020 album The Plague Garden was hailed by WNYC/NPR, Outburn, Instinct, mxdwn, ReGen, Audiofemme, and Philadelphia Gay News, amongst many others.    

CARNIVAL DUST EP
Tracking listing

Cuckoo
The Changeling
Medicine Show
The Old Ragdoll
Clockwork Romance
Lost In Time

“Carnival Dust is a collaborative project,” Ryder offers, explaining the synergistic nature of the record. “My friend Dennis Herbert wrote ‘Lost in Time.’ Joe Ford at South Brooklyn Sound recorded the song at Dennis’s enchanted house. Film Faerie Lisa M Thomas of Thin Edge Films produced and directed the ‘Lost in Time’ video, which was also partly shot at Dennis’s house. Mike Schoonmaker (former sound engineer at Helsinki Hudson) recorded, mixed and mastered all the other songs on the album. Jon B. Woodin wrote ‘Clockwork Romance’ and performed lead vocals and guitar on the song. Jon and I wrote ‘Medicine Show’ together during the pandemic. Stephen Spera shot the band photos and designed the album artwork. The whole thing was a wonderful team effort, and we enjoyed every minute of creating this album!”

The Dust Bowl Faeries is Ryder Cooley (Faerie Queen; accordion, singing saw, lead vocals), Jon B. Woodin (Rocket Faerie; guitar, vocals), Rubi LaRue (Feisty Faerie; lapsteel, vocals), Liz LoGiudice (River Faerie; bass, vocals) and Andrew Stein (Time Faerie; percussion).

John Huba Bio

John Huba began his career at 16 years old for his local newspaper the Peekskill Evening Star. After spending several decades in New York City he returned back to the Hudson Valley and currently lives Woodstock, New York where he frequently collaborates with local artists while continuing his work as a photographer/cinematographer.   

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