Magdalena Bay: The Imaginal Mystery Tour

Somewhere in the ether/net of our collective social cosmos soup floats the magical, masterful pop music of Magdalena Bay, the duo from Los Angeles composed of Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin. While the pair may claim California as its terra firma, its true home is in the clouds, from where the two emit and output the unique yet familiar frequencies of synthesized nostalgia, kitschy catchiness, and bombastically warped neo-hooks for which the group has become celebrated. Transmitting in both the audio and video realms, Magdalena Bay is an entity adroitly suited for these times, caught in a haze of the known and felt while pushing sonic landscapes woven with the now into the next.

Having met as teenagers in a high school music program in their hometown of Miami (Tenebaum having moved to Florida at age 1 from Buenos Aires), each quickly recognized a kismet and kindred spirit in the other, resulting in the formation of a band, the prog outfit Tabula Rasa, as well as a romance. Lewin was a self-styled guitar shredder armed with his dad’s prog and concept rock records — The Wall, The Bends, Genesis, Fiona Apple — while Tenenbaum was a pianist and singer dipping toes in indie (Modest Mouse) and emo (My Chemical Romance) rock as well as pop made by princesses (Shakira, Britney). Both could read music and Lewin had even studied music theory, also teaching himself how to produce, record, and mix while making two Tabula Rasa records. The pair took a brief break from dating and headed to different colleges but kept the band together, often trading eight-hour bus rides from Penn to Northeastern and vice versa to rehearse, before eventually realizing two things: one, their relationship was too real to be denied, and two, no one young likes prog.

“It was like, ‘No one's listening to our prog music, what a shame,’” Tenebaum says with a laugh. “We were excited to try something different. So we got into the mechanics of ‘what does it mean to write a pop song?’ and ‘what is this craft?’ and that was the beginning of Magdalena Bay.”

“I remember thinking, ‘Pop music is simple, so we should be able to make it,’” Lewin says. “And then, of course, there's way more to it, lots of complexities in the writing and production that I wasn't aware of. We had no artistic perspective at that point because we were still figuring out the genre and how to make something that resembled pop music before we could think about how we could make it interesting. So that was our early process.”

Holding tight to that all-encompassing genre descriptor (“We make pop, but what really is pop anyway?” Tenenbaum asks, while Lewin counters, “We're a pop group making pop music; all the rest is implied…I think it's fun to imply that pop music is a wide range of things”), the duo released a grip of EPs and singles before launching its debut album Mercurial World in the fall of 2021. Many outlets, while uniformly praising its melodic hooks, sing-song vocals, and meticulously-crafted production, called it “synth-pop,” which is probably the most specific subgenre Lewin and Tenenbaum will allow. Regardless, the mark had been made, and Magdalena Bay soon began to gather respect, adulation, and fans in the true currency of the day: streaming numbers, social media followers, support slots, festival appearances, and creative collabs. All the while, aided by its highly stylized online aesthetic and internet presence, the band was inching closer to realizing something of an artistic perspective after all. 

“We love extending the world of our music past sound into videos or a website or graphics or whatever it might be,” Tenenbaum says.

“We like to think of them as one and the same, but I think it has to start with the music,” Lewin says. “We're trying to create an atmosphere or an emotional quality with it.”

“It's the jumping off point that inspires the rest,” Tenenbaum agrees. “But as the years have gone by, as we’ve made more and more videos and such, the process has become more integrated. We were having visual ideas, which was never the case before. I guess people call it ‘world-building.’”

Nourished By Time, the Baltimore based songwriter/producer with a unique blend of New Wave, R&B, and Dance, Nourished By Time's music explores themes of existentialism, love, consumerism and their relationship with labor.

The project was initially created in Los Angeles (where the artist used to live in Koreatown) at the end of 2019. After two years of failure and artistic differences with a creative partner, the impulsive artist abruptly left LA and drove solo across the country, back to his hometown of Baltimore. Where they would work odd jobs, attempt to recover mentally, fall In love, get heartbroken and obsessively write songs under Nourished By Time. In 2022, the artist had their first label release with the 2 song Erotic Probiotic — EP under the London indie label Scenic Route. This year NBT joined 4AD's post punk band Dry Cleaning on a 20 stop tour of North America as well as a remix of their album track 'Gary Ashby.' Continuing to build his collaborative credentials, he also features on progressive electronic artist Yaeji's debut album, With A Hammer on XL Recordings. This all before dropping his critically acclaimed album Erotic Probiotic 2, picked up Pitchfork's 'Best New Music' and featured on 'Best Of 2024' lists on Gorilla vs Bear (#1), Pitchfork (#5), The Guardian, The Fader, Paste and more.

2024 has kicked off with the announcement of Nourished By Time signing to the iconic UK imprint XL Recordings, returning with his new EP, Catching Chickens released on 22 March digitally and on 12" vinyl. Written between 2022 — 2023 in his home studio in Baltimore, Catching Chickens takes inspiration from the iconic scene in Rocky II where his trainer makes him chase and catch chickens as a test of agility. With tracks like "Hell of a Ride," in which Nourished By Time contemplates the fall of the American empire and late-stage capitalism loneliness, and "Had Ya Called," which deals with the frustrations of growing distance in friendships, Nourished By Time chronicles his own test of agility as he weaves through the motions of his newfound notability. Support across The Face, Flaunt, Pitchfork, Hypebeast, Pigeons & Planes, Loud & Quiet, BBC 6 Music and more.

"Arthur Russell meets Daft Punk but deep R&B…the only new music I absolutely swear is next level." – Oneohtrix Point Never

"Nourished By Time can touch feelings that cannot be put into words" – Yaeji

"a DIY pop star who turns every limitation into an asset." – Pitchfork

"Marcus Brown's blend of '90s R&B and '80s freestyle is so impressive because it appears to have arrived fully formed" – Paste Magazine

"an artist adept at extracting elements from music's past and creating something uniquely individual." – The FADER