Lowertown are having their indie rock moment, and it all started with a very relatable problem: burnout.
Three years ago, Olivia Osby and Avsha Weinberg—the 24-year-old New York-based duo behind the buzzy indie band—were exhausted. A grueling European tour had taken its toll on their nearly decade-long friendship, and they knew something had to give. So they returned to Atlanta, their hometown, and started over.
"The album was kind of the reestablishing of our friendship," Weinberg reveals to Rolling Stone. While holed up in their respective Atlanta basements—the same spots where they'd tracked songs as teenagers—the pair created Ugly Duckling Union, their third LP and first in four years.
During their first jam session, Weinberg laid down a guitar line and Osby was struck with inspiration, instantly crafting lyrics. "That was the first one where we were like, 'This is it,'" Osby recalls. "We realized this was a song that was finished and beautiful." That track became "Mice Protection," the album opener, complete with folky guitars and the intimate texture of hands clapping on wood.
After meeting in a high school math class, the pair formed Lowertown in 2018 and quickly caught fire. Their debut album Friends caught the attention of Dirty Hit—the legendary English indie label behind The 1975—and suddenly these teenagers were signed. But as their 2022 album I Love to Lie launched them into heavy touring cycles with artists like Wet Leg and beabadoobee, something shifted.
"We wanted it to feel like how we felt when we made that first album where it was just the two of us and no outside influence," Weinberg says of the new record. Ugly Duckling Union drops Friday.
