Out Today: UNI and The Urchins’ Debut Album, Simulator (Chimera Music)

More on UNI and the Urchins, and on Simulator:

Formerly known as Uni, UNI and The Urchins are the post-apocalyptic rock & roll cult led by vocalist and NYC nightlife fixture Jack James Busa and ex-GOASTT bassist Charlotte Kemp Muhl. Combining acrobatic post-punk with glittery glam rock, V Magazine once described the band’s sound as “in their own league and therefore genre.” 

Simulator, out today, was written (and mixed/mastered/engineered by Kemp) mostly in isolation in the woods of Upstate NY, but takes listeners on a cosmic journey through a "lobotomized disco" world of silicone sex doll factories, crucifix manufacturers and iPhone graveyards, in a Camus-esque dive into the ways technology has permanently changed our lives and, quite literally, us. 

Listen to Simulator HERE

And in the same DIY vein as the making of the album, every song on Simulator also has an epic corresponding music video directed/edited/colorized (the whole bit) by Kemp herself. Self-taught in every respect - she left school for a modeling career after the sixth grade - Kemp has directed each pre-Simulator UNI and The Urchins video to date, and her surrealist style has gained her additional gigs directing videos for bands such as The Smashing Pumpkins and The Killers' Mark Stoermer.

Check out UNI and the Urchins’ YouTube channel to see all their music videos to date: https://www.youtube.com/@UNIandTheUrchins

Largely written alongside the pandemic-accelerated collapse of civilization - and society’s resulting shift from a “real world” to a virtual world of humanoid avatars - Simulator was inspired by Kemp, Jack, and guitarist David Strange’s love-hate relationship with the black magic of technology. After years of cynicism towards the modern world, it’s a trio of retro-rock-loving musicians’ determination to accurately riff on the musical processes of their predecessors, which always looked forward, not behind. As Ziggy looked to the space race and moon landing as defining zeitgeists of his time, UNI and The Urchins look to the Singularity and the horizon of VR replacing all flesh. 

Their motto for this new era? Mutate or Die

About Chimera Music

Chimera Music, formed in 2008 in the Manhattan kitchen of Sean Ono Lennon and Charlotte Kemp Muhl, has released the pair's many projects as well as music by Yoko Ono, Moonlandingz, Black Lips, RZA, Iggy Pop, Ahohni, Tune-yards, John Zorn & others. 

About Frontman Jack James

Jack James is the androgynous alien front-man, starring in and co-creative directing UNI and The Urchins’ transmedia production house. He appears in television shows such as the FOX series Gotham, Rock Me, and the lead role in feature film, Mister Sister, a performance which earned him a Winter Film Awards nomination for Best Actor. From Blackbook magazine: “Singer Jack James’ ghostly falsetto makes the proceedings all the more eerie and disconcerting… an alarmingly tall man who resembles a cult character from horror movies… vocal chops oozing charisma and star power.” He can also appear at your Bar Mitzvah dressed as the lovechild of Kenneth Anger and Peewee Herman for the small fee of 13 Fabergé eggs and your immortal soul.

About Bassist Charlotte Kemp Muhl

Shedding her Maybelline model image, bassist Charlotte Kemp Muhl has a background in psych rock from The GOASTT, her band with Sean Ono Lennon, their album Midnight Sun hailed by Rolling Stone and NPR as a best-of-the-year. She has since played bass on Jack White's Boarding House Reach, acted as a zombie in Jim Jarmusch's The Dead Don't Die, and composed the score for an upcoming Crispin Glover film. She has directed all of UNI and The Urchins’ videos and mini-films, and engineered, mixed and mastered their new album Simulator herself. A workaholic and a diehard control freak, her biology is 70% composed of cup ramen and useless science factoids. 

For more information, contact Hannah Schwartz