Brisbane’s Inovo dive headfirst into an intense new alt-prog track in ‘Swim Alone’; an immersive release that meshes grooves with moody textures, and transports the listener to an ambient, hazy realm.

Teaming up with the new track is a visceral music video, drawing you deeper into the band’s sonic universe, ahead of Inovo officially launching ‘Swim Alone’ at the BackDock Arts in their hometown of Brisbane on Friday, March 31.

‘Swim Alone’ is an intense listen for the alt-prog adventurer, with dusty atmospheric synths mixing with guitars wet with delay, combining into a stunning, rich proggy silt. The bass bounces between the more hectic lead lines, while still holding the fort rhythmically, allowing the drums to really dance over cymbal splashes and a multitude of fills. Stylistically, the vocals shift between Periphery’s Spencer Sotelo (in his more milder moments) and Porcupine Tree’s Steven Wilson, doubling up in the big moments, and adding layers of mystery underneath. At just under three and a half minutes, it’s a tad short for an alt-prog track, but the listener will be more than satisfied with how much is crammed into this journey.

Pulsing with artsy alt-rock and explorative flourishes, Swim Alone firmly displays inovo’s love of unorthodox rhythms, a la Karnivool, Incubus and Tool, along with the colourful, textured storytelling of the likes of Tesseract, Devin Townsend and Thrice.

With guitarist Rhys Tyack editing and tracking parts in the band’s studio, Swim Alone also reached its layered and dreamlike present state via James See mixing, and Steve Smart wrangling the levels for mastering. Moody, modern and sonically expansive, Swim Alone’s surreal qualities stem partially from an actual dream experienced by vocalist Declan Nicholls, with roots also flowing from a song devised by the band’s former guitarist.

“It’s about a dream I once had about a gigantic humanoid entity drifting through space, swinging off of planets to change its trajectory,” shares Declan of Swim Alone’s origins. “In the dream I was a prophet on earth that had predicted its imminent approach to Earth, and wanted to warn everyone that it will be here soon and bring about the end of the world”. “Swim Alone is actually based off an old song our ex-guitarist Jamie created called ‘It Swims Above’,” adds Rhys. “We loved the elements but couldn’t perform it when we were reduced to a smaller group. It’s completely different but if you squint your ears during a full moon you can hear a glimpse of similarity.”

Perfectly complementing the glossy darkness and cascading grooves, the accompanying music video for Swim Alone marries the track’s lyrics of uncertainty and angst with riveting and disconcerting visuals. Shooting the video themselves over a series of weekends, special effects masks, costumes, body organs and props were made by guitarist Rhys, whose work as a cinematographer has seen him shoot music videos for Halfway, Sarah Stockholm, Daylight Ghosts and many more.

Drawing together a team of actors, friends and crew, the clip ultimately oozes with sharp aesthetics and boundless imagination. “Declan writes all the lyrics which invokes a very vivid representation of the story and meaning,” shares Rhys of making Swim Alone’s music video. “I wanted the story to take some of that and combine it with the feeling I had when I wrote the track. In the video we incorporated quite a lot of symbolism and centralised the theme around confinement, while keeping a cosmic horror aesthetic. We wanted to create a visceral dimension to parallel our reality, or collective experience, relying on semiotics for layers of meaning. Every shot was storyboarded as we didn't have a lot of time on-set once people had intestines glued to their stomach or full-faced latex masks muting sense receptors.”

Sharing a love for thought-provoking music and haunting tonalities, inovo started life when Declan, Rhys and drummer Jackson Caswell met at university before evolving into their present iteration, with bass player Karl O’Shea joining a few years later after meeting in a shared rehearsal space. Originally called Solus before changing to inovo, Latin for ‘in the egg’ reflecting the conceptual and embryonic nature of their songs, inovo is ultimately passion project dedicated to making music that each band member loves, with significant emphasis on storytelling, irregular rhythms and arrangements that pervade deep into your soul.

inovo’s live show is an equally memorable affair, with the band set to launch Swim Alone on Friday 31 March at BackDock Arts in Brisbane - and there may just be a few surprises in store. “We may have a few surprises coming up, maybe…” teases Jackson of the upcoming launch show. “We like to keep things fun and unpredictable,” adds Declan of inovo’s live performances. “We tend to move with the music, so one minute we might be chill, and the next minute really not so chill”.

A labour of love, Swim Alone is just the beginning of a huge 2023 for inovo, with the group primed to reveal even more musical goodness in the near future. “It’s very relieving to release Swim Alone,” says Rhys. “We’ve been working on these songs for quite some time so it’s exciting to release our child outside of our collective womb into the big wide world”. “We worked so hard on this song and the video,” concludes Declan, “and now that it’s finally going to be out there in the world I just hope it’s something people connect with and enjoy. We have so much more to show you guys, so if you like what we do – then watch this space. Also, I love you.”

Swim Alone is out now, and the band will be sharing a new single every fortnight thereafter, leading into the album, Desmoterion, which is set for release on May 10.

Check out ‘Swim Alone’ on all streaming platforms, and follow them to complete their journey of their album release in May.