ABOUT PRETTY SOMETHING:

Austin-based synth-pop band Pretty Something marks artist and producer Joe Durniak’s first solo release since 2017. After walking away from his former band Cultfever following a 10-year run in the NYC indie scene, he turned his efforts to audio mixing for TV and film as well as producing other musicians’ work. Part of his storytelling stems from the emotional complication of bringing others’ art to fruition while feeling stunted in his own creative space. After moving from New York to Austin in 2019, Durniak made the bold decision to step out from under the cloud of the “what-ifs” of the music industry, and life in general, and during the pandemic, returned to the craft that had kept him going for the majority of his life. Holed up in his home studio, he was finally able to channel his thoughts into his first self-produced project in nearly 10 years.

 

The EP uniquely addresses Durniak’s ongoing relationship to chronic pain and mental health, bringing to the surface topics that are all too often swept under the rug. The subjects broached in the writing are a product not only of physical challenges that brought on his partial inability to perform, but also the internal anguish that has long accompanied what he’s faced both medically and professionally. 

 

“Pretty Something is the sound of learning to live with yourself,” says Durniak. “These songs came out of pain, but they also brought me back to joy. I wanted to make something that could hold both, the heaviness and the hope, and maybe give people a little light while they’re figuring it out too.”