Los Angeles’ Militarie Gun share new song “Thought You Were Waving” alongside a cheeky Neta Ben Ezra-directed video portraying the band in unruly and dangerous situations. “Thought You Were Waving” was featured by Zane Lowe today on his New Music Daily show and marks the first proper new music from the band since the release of their lauded debut album Life Under The Gun last year, ushering in a new chapter for the limitless band. “Thought You Were Waving” was created with Zachary Dawes (Lana Del Rey, Sharon van Etten, Bully, Elton John).
“Thought You Were Waving is a song about not knowing when someone else is asking you for help, we are all so caught up in our own lives that it can be really easy to miss the subtle smoke signals of others.” explains Militarie Gun’s Ian Shelton. “At the same time, it is also about not knowing how to ask for help. I wanted to do a continually descending melody with a very tough backbone, kind of like if the Beatles rhythm section was made of idiot punk musicians. Everything we do is through the lens of idiot punk musicians.”
“Thought You Were Waving” closely follows Militarie Gun’s recent Australian tour which saw the band perform headline dates across the country, as well as support Hockey Dad at huge shows in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney. The song’s release also follows the band’s track “Gun Under The Gun (MFG)”, which was created for the new WWE 2K24 video game as the walk-in music for Post Malone’s wrestling character. Post Malone also included the band’s “Do It Faster” on his curated playlist for the WWE 2K24 soundtrack.
Militarie Gun will continue to traverse the globe through the end of the year, which includes their highly anticipated headline hometown show in Los Angeles on 25 July with support from Gouge Away, Heart to Gold and Human Garbage. The band will also perform at various festivals, including Lollapalooza, Project Pabst, Thing Festival, Reading & Leeds, Louder Than Life, Aftershock and more, this year. Militarie Gun will also head across the pond for a string of European tour dates with Lip Critic, Pluto The Racer, Never Yours, Chiefland, daysdaysdays and Tripsun on select dates. This September, Militarie Gun will join Manchester Orchestra during their 10 year anniversary COPE tour across North America. Tickets for all of Militarie Gun’s upcoming live dates can be found HERE.
Earlier this year, Militarie Gun released their mini-documentary Live Under The Sun, which sees the band and a host of their Life Under The Sun EP collaborators reunite at Manchester Orchestra’s Atlanta studio to further reimagine the tracks featured on their aforementioned EP, with guest performances from Manchester Orchestra, Marisa Dabice of Mannequin Pussy and Christine Goodwyne of Pool Kids, who steps in for Alicia Bognanno of Bully for a performance of “Never Fucked Up Twice”. Live Under The Sunprovides a window into the growing community around Militarie Gun while highlighting bandleader Ian Shelton’s dynamic and expectation-defying songwriting.
Life Under The Sun strips back a selection of songs from Militarie Gun’s breakout debut album Life Under The Gun, which was released last summer, putting Ian Shelton’s intensely personal songwriting center stage. Life Under The Sun includes “Never Fucked Up Twice” featuring Bully’s Alicia Bognanno, “Very High (Under The Sun)”, “My Friends Are Having A Hard Time” featuring Manchester Orchestra, “Will Logic” featuring Mannequin Pussy and the cover of NOFX track “Whoops I OD’d”.
Life Under The Gun was one of 2023’s most celebrated albums, released to praise from the likes of Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, NME, Revolver, Stereogum, SPIN, Paste, The FADER and more. The album landed on multiple best albums of 2023 lists including Alternative Press, The Ringer, UPROXX, Stereogum and Rolling Stone, who said Life Under The Gun has “taken everything that’s uniquely cathartic about the hardcore and lacquered it with insanely catchy melodies.” That catchiness has been on full display on TV with Taco Bell’s ad campaign that prominently features Life Under The Gun’s “Do It Faster”.
Check out “Thought You Were Waving” above and see below for 2024 live dates.
“Thought You Were Waving” by Militarie Gun out now.
