Photo Credit : Jeff Carroll, Michael Miller, Nick Hess
Live electronic duo Host Bodies have bottled the sound and atmosphere of San Francisco’s Ocean Beach into a modern take on psychedelic dance music—thanks to singer-songwriter Alexa Jesse. Their first single together, ‘Hourglass,” features her smoky, soulful voice sweeping like an intoxicating breeze over swaggering basslines, moody synths, and idiosyncratic drums. ‘Hourglass’ has everything to do with timing, and as the days grow longer, the multifaceted track is bound to fall like grains of golden sand into summer playlists.
Following a string of viral releases including Techenoch, Refuge and Treehouse that launched the Host Bodies name before a well-versed group of electronic fans, ‘Hourglass’ continues to effortlessly blur genres. The sonic complexity and depth of the production benefit from mixing and mastering by Count Eldridge (Radiohead, Tycho, Thievery Corporation), while the poetry and vulnerability that Alexa Jesse brings into her music helps the song connect with a wider audience.
Echoes of futuristic genres are interlaced with divine, feminine energy as the track rises and falls over the course of its inventive arrangement. Listeners literally follow Alexa Jesse on an internal journey. After a three-year hiatus from music as she tended to her personal relationships and career in psychedelics, the songstress maintains her zest for confronting emotions rooted in unfeigned experiences, while continuing to discover a pure means of translating and understanding human emotions.
“Looking back, it’s clear I wrote this song to cope and heal from a traumatic experience. We live in a fragile reality that can be shattered at any moment. Yet time keeps ticking, we keep moving along, each moment is so delicately precious yet we take much of our life for granted. Ultimately we don’t know what comes next but I believe that we’re part of something bigger, and that great unknown is a mysterious, beautiful part of the journey.” – Alexa Jesse
Mirroring their beachy surroundings, ‘Hourglass’ captures the essence of that curiosity and wonder expressed by her lyrics: “What will we find at the edge of the night?” Indeed, the track exists freely to remind electronic and psychedelic lovers that the vital energy of dancing barefoot in the sand at the edge of a continent is right here, right now in every present moment.
“Host Bodies brings a certain mad scientist approach to our production. ‘Hourglass’ started with James Collector’s arpeggiated ngoni riff and Nick Hess’s Fender jazz basslines. The percussion was built with randomly triggered djembe hits and a techno-inspired drum kit. Korg Minilogue chords added a moody atmosphere. By the time Alexa Jesse started writing the track a couple of years had passed. We were blown away with the feeling of her first demo of lyrics and melody.” – Host Bodies
About Host Bodies and Alexa Jesse
It’s still dark when singer-songwriter Alexa Jesse arrives at Ocean Beach, San Francisco for the 6AM video shoot with Host Bodies. Their first single together, “Hourglass,” features Alexa gracing a psychedelic dance track built on the live-electronic duo’s swaggering basslines, atmospheric synths, and idiosyncratic drums.
Alexa’s lyric, “What will we find at the edge of the night?” seems posed against the beach as surf booms and a breeze carries drifts of sand over the empty Great Highway. Director and bassist, Nick Hess, reviews the storyboard with the cameraman while producer, James Collector, prepares to drive his vintage camper van onto the dunes for the opening shot. The day looks clear, a well-timed window between winter storms. Timing has everything to do with Hourglass.
After a shared 2020 gig was cancelled by shelter-in-place, Alexa Jesse and Host Bodies started exchanging musical ideas. Hourglass surfaced soon after, a smoky demo that has since evolved into a polished groove mastered by Count Eldridge (Tycho, DJ Shadow, Radiohead) for release on 19th May 2023.
As colour creeps into the sky, Alexa steps onto the sand. The music is cued. The camera brings her into focus. By the end of the day, she’ll be dancing barefoot in the waves under a fiery sunset—until then, there is only this present moment and the next, grains falling one by one.