BLONDSHELL Shares Her Take On The Cranberries’ “Disappointment”

Announces Headline Summer Tour

Blondshell (aka Sabrina Teitelbaum) will release her highly anticipated self-titled debut album via Partisan Records. Today she gives listeners a special treat by way of her take of The Cranberries’ deep cut “Disappointment” – a fan favorite that she played all last month on her sold-out tour with Suki Waterhouse. It’s a non-album track, yet a powerful display of this artist-to-watch’s eye-popping vocal range & use of loud/soft dynamics.

Of the track, Blondshell says, “I wanted to sing a song off of No Need To Argue, which is one of my favorite albums ever. Dolores’ voice carries so much emotion throughout the entire album, not just on the big hits like ‘Zombie,’ but on the more understated songs as well. ‘Disappointment’ hits me so hard because it feels like heartbreak disguised as apathy. I wanted to sing the song how I heard it, with the intensity of the pain behind those airy, relaxed vocals and drums.”

The song premiered on The Matt Wilkinson Show on Apple Music and you can listen to it here. To accompany the cover Blondshell has also released a lyric video made up of both digital and super-8 footage of her recent hometown show at the Fonda in LA. Watch the clip here:

Blondshell is also excited to announce her first headline tour of North America. The dates kick off July 7 in Portland, OR and conclude in San Francisco, CA on August 4. Along the way she will stop in New York City on July 19 and Los Angeles, CA on August 2. Brooklyn’s Hello Mary will be the support for most of the tour. Additionally, Blondshell will make her return to Austin for SXSW 2023 followed by a headline tour of the UK and Europe and slots at The Great Escape, London Calling, Wide Awake Festival, and Primavera Sound. All dates are below and tickets are on sale this Friday, here.

In the past few years, the 25-year-old Teitelbaum has transformed into a songwriter without fear. The loud-quiet excavations that comprise the hook-filled Blondshell don’t only stare traumas in the eye, they tear them at the root and shake them, bringing precise detail to colossal feelings. They’re clear-eyed statements of and about digging your way towards confidence, self-possession, and relief.

Teitelbaum starting teasing Blondshell in 2022, capturing the attention of music critics and fans along the way with singles “Olympus,” “Kiss City,” “Veronica Mars,” and “Sepsis,” which Rolling Stone listed as their #1 Pick of the Month for their “Recommends” column. Last fall Blondshell also released non-album track “Cartoon Earthquake” as part of the Spotify Singles series. Earlier this year Sabrina announced her album with the release of “Joiner” and Rolling Stone said “Inspired by Britpop, the track is like a darker Coffee & TV,’ containing a sunny acoustic chorus that contrasts with lyrics about scoring drugs and sleeping in bars with a gun in your bag.”

Born and raised in New York City, Teitelbaum moved to Los Angeles for music school in 2015. Entering USC’s Pop Program, she was swept into a context where the brooding pop legacies of Lorde and Lana Del Rey reigned. She dropped out after two years, but while there studied classic and jazz theory, and the art of harmonies, and found herself writing songs inside the world of pop studio sessions.

The biggest gift the pop machine gave her was the stark clarity of realizing that she didn’t quite belong there. Her music was increasingly too raw and intense to easily categorize, and after finishing her last full-on pop EP with producer Yves Rothman (Yves Tumor, Girlpool, Porches) at the start of the pandemic, she gave herself permission to write without expectation. She began penning songs just for herself, with no thought that she would release them. The process emboldened her. Subtracting self-consciousness became a catalyst for the lucid songs of Blondshell, on which her experiences all coalesce to form her truest expressions of self yet. “It was me, as a person, in my songs,” she says. When she showed a few to Rothman, he encouraged her to write an album, joining a chorus of friends saying, “This is you.”

That bracing honesty charges every note of Blondshell. With the world at a screeching halt, she recommitted to guitar and revisited the galvanic 90s alt-rock of Nirvana and Hole, absorbing their simmers and explosions, the crests and contours that made their abrasive version of pop so potent. Immersing herself into books, too—particularly the writing of Patti Smith, Rebecca Solnit, Rachel Cusk, and Clare Sestanovich—she found patience and permission.

For all its complicated, soul-baring subject matter—processing post-lockdown social anxiety, her relationships with men as well as with women—Blondshell is a comfort, and its songs often contain the perfectly-calibrated humor and levity we need to survive. “There were a lot of things that I was running away from—mainly loneliness, self-esteem stuff,” Teitelbaum says.

It all left her yearning to make the kind of music that has helped her feel empowered herself—and the way there was in telling the truth. “I always want to make people feel like they have more power and control and peace because I know what it feels like to want that for myself. I know how music has helped me get there,” she says. “What I’ve realized I need to do is write realistically, and try to not bring shame into the writing. Each song gave me more confidence. I hope the songs help people in that way, too.”

Blondshell tracklisting

Veronica Mars
Kiss City
Olympus
Salad
Sepsis
Sober Together
Joiner
Tarmac
Dangerous

Blondshell SXSW Schedule:

Wed Mar 15: TBC pm – Brooklyn Vegan @ Mohawk

Wed Mar 15: 11pm – SPIN @ The Pershing

Thu Mar 16: 1pm – KCSN @ Convention Center

Thu Mar 16: 3:30pm – FLOOD @ Mohawk

Fri Mar 17: 10:30am – KGSR / ACL Radio @ Hotel Van Zandt

Fri Mar 17: 6pm – SXSanJose @ Hotel San Jose

Fri Mar 17: 10pm – Line of Best Fit @ Swan Dive

Blondshell Live Dates – new dates in bold:

05/11 – Brighton, UK – The Great Escape Festival

05/13 – Paris, France – Point Éphémère ^

05/14 – Tourcoing, France – Le Grand Mix ^

05/15 – Cologne, Germany – Helios37 ^

05/17 – Berlin, Germany – Privatclub ^

05/18 – Hamburg, Germany – Molotow SkyBar ^

05/19 – Amsterdam, Netherlands – London Calling Festival

05/20 – Brussels, Belgium – Botanique

05/24 – London, UK – Moth Club ~

05/25 – Manchester, UK – YES ^

05/26 – Bristol, UK – The Louisiana &

05/27 – London, UK – Wide Awake Festival

05/30 – Barcelona, Spain – Primavera Festival

06/6 – Madrid, Spain – Primavera Festival

06/9 – Porto, Portugal – Primavera Festival

7/7 – Polaris Hall – Portland, OR *

7/8 – Madam Lous – Seattle, WA *

7/11 – 7th Street – Minneapolis, MN *

7/12 – Schubas – Chicago, IL *

7/14 – The Garrison – Toronto, ON *

7/15 – Bar Le Ritz PDB – Montreal, QC *

7/16 – Middle East Upstairs – Boston, MA *

7/19 – Bowery Ballroom – New York, NY *

7/21 – PhilaMOCA – Philadelphia, PA

7/22 – DC9 – Washington, DC

7/24 – Third Man – Nashville, TN *

7/25 – Aisle 5 – Atlanta, GA *

7/27 – Antone’s – Austin, TX *

7/28 – White Oak (Upstairs) – Houston, TX *

7/29 – Club Dada – Dallas, TX *

8/1 – Valley Bar – Phoenix, AZ *

8/2 – The Roxy – Los Angeles, CA *

8/4 – Cafe Du Nord – San Francisco, CA *

* Hello Mary support

^ Girl & Girl support

~ Platonica Erotica support

& Oslo Twins support

S.L.R. Magazine