** Limited Edition, transparent blue & green split** Super Monster is 13 songs of irresistible charm and a vertiginous but joyous coming-of-age reckoning with young love. A skilled lyricist with an extraordinary gift for writing infectious melodies, Claud sees relationships as games of endless wonder, intrigue and second-guesses; a roller-coaster thrilling you, even when it’s terrifying. From beginning to end, the sparkling tunes capture the assorted stages of a relationship’s delight and dejection – the giddy sensation of a first kiss, the heartsick longing of a pending rejection and the reluctant call for a requisite breakup. The first single from the album, “Gold,” was released to widespread acclaim in October. Standing at 5 feet tall with green and blue hair (hair color subject to change), 21-year old Claud Mintz is a prolific and industrious talent. The first signing to Phoebe Bridgers’ new label imprint with Dead Oceans, Claud has been stealthily releasing impressively agile pop songs for the last two years. First recording as Toast in 2018, with their best college friend Joshua Mehling at Syracuse University, Claud’s early string of track releases were immediately impressive. The band was casual but enthusiastic and Claud would spend whatever time remained between classes writing to beats, eventually opting to leave Syracuse to focus on music. Life and output became feverish and more than 50 songs emerged during that brief span. In early 2020, Claud sorted through those dozens of pieces, whittling them down to the baker’s dozen that now shape Super Monster, and headed home to New York to record at Electric Lady Studios with a wide network of close friends and new collaborators. Joshua Mehling played on and co-produced several tracks and the old friends were joined by Claire Cottrill (aka Clairo), Melanie Faye, Blu Detiger, Noa Getzug, Nick Hakim and Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Jake Portrait. The album’s artwork is a self-portrait by Claud and serves not just as album art, but as superhero mascot. Upon finishing a long day at Electric Lady, the studio owner uncovered and shared an as-yet-unpublished drawing by the late, great Daniel Johnston depicting a person leaping triumphantly from the surrounding grass. It was titled “Claud and the Super Monster” and, for Claud, the drawing and title depicted perfectly how the undefinable is often viewed as monstrous when it is in fact, freeing, even ascendant. Misunderstood, maybe, but also imbued with superpowers. The album’s working title was quickly usurped and the Super Monster was born.
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