Talking with Glacier Veins

Glacier Veins is a local dream-punk band, and over the last two years they’ve caught the attention of the West Coast and beyond.

Photos by Fletcher Wold

So what exactly is “dream-punk”? In the case of Glacier Veins’ latest EP, “Dreamspace,” it’s a combination of powerful vocals, drums that keep everything pushing forward, and fast-paced guitars laced in atmospheric tones.

Vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter Malia Endres is the core of the band. It started as an acoustic project in 2015, but she quickly enlisted the help of her friends to bring the songs to life. Glacier Veins has rotated through several lineups since its start, and spent most of this year as a three-piece group, but at its most recent concert introduced a new lead guitarist, Josh Springer. The band also features Kyle Woodrow on bass and MHCC alumnus Tyler Groce on drums.

Endres couldn’t quite pinpoint the sound she tries to create when making music, but compared it to bands such as Balance and Composure, Citizen, and Movements.

“There’s a sound in my head that I really feel,” she said.

Her lyrical inspiration comes from random life events that emotionally impact her, whether it be in a good or bad way. There are lots of reoccurring themes throughout “Dreamspace” that revolve around progression and self-growth, which is a change from Glacier Veins’ first EP, “Clear Your Head,” which was much more sad and angsty.

At the end of the summer, the band announced it had signed with Common Ground Records, an independent record label based out of L.A., and it felt like the next natural step.

“For me, it’s been easier because I was doing a lot of the stuff like getting the last EP on Spotify, and making sure we had physical copies of it available,” Endres said. Now, she shares the workload with the label that helped arrange the business aspects of releasing “Dreamspace.”

The band was also excited to have an entirely new network of connections through Common Ground. It got to co-host a segment on Idobi Radio, a popular alternative online radio show, and they’ve been featured on specially curated Spotify playlists. This has made the play counts on its singles skyrocket into the thousands, in just one month. Every song on “Clear Your Head” has over 5,000 plays, with the most popular track on the album having over 11,000 listens.

Glacier Veins has played a large number of big shows over the last two years. The group has opened the Portland shows for touring bands such as Superheaven, Tiny Moving Parts, Anarbor, and most recently Have Mercy. It has also made appearances at popular festivals and events. It performed at the Portland stop of the 2016 Vans Warped Tour; the Treefort Fest in Boise, Idaho, earlier this year; and Emo Nite in L.A. when it finished its end-of-summer West Coast tour with Chris Swartz.

Endres said the band’s favorite shows this year included in Chico, California, where the music scene is embedded in a college town, and the people who come out to shows have a visibly good time with every artist, whether they know their music or not. She added that headlining Portland’s Hawthorne Theatre for its own tour kick-off was a special night because of the number of friends, family and fans that filled the room.

It’s clear that Glacier Veins won’t be slowing down anytime soon, so what’s next?

The band will appear Tuesday, Nov. 7, on the Sounds of PDX show hosted on the Portland Radio Project, from 7 to 9 p.m., and will play a show Dec. 7 with Sundressed and Nominee at the Analog Café.

To keep up with the latest from the band, follow @GlacierVeinsPDX on social media.