21-year-old Maxime Trippenbach, a.k.a. maxime., makes lush, colourful indie-pop from his home in Ottawa, Canada. Today he releases new single ‘the apathy song’ – lifted from upcoming debut album ‘whatevernowiscalled’ out December 6th via AWAL. Quirky and distinctive, maxime. is an artist who sees progression and experimentation as his natural right of passage.
Bringing together stylistic elements from a variety of spaces – on new single ‘the apathy song’ crisp, electronic instrumentals are partnered with sparse synth arrangements and chugging guitars – with Trippenbach’s hushed, raw vocal neatly amidst the instrumental breaks.
Feeling inspired to make a change, he began to write songs with his own vocals for the first time. In April, 2019, he released ‘crying in the club’, the first EP to feature maxime. as the sole songwriter, vocalist, producer and engineer. More recently, “Spooktober” and “Mariuh,” both singles off his 2nd EP of the year, September’s ‘Pity Party’, were added to Spotify’s coveted “Fresh Finds” in consecutive weeks, garnering significant press, too.
Now, the 21-year-old is gearing up for the release of his debut album, the 18-track whatevernowiscalled. The project is one that sees Max address a number of personal subjects: (loss of) relationships, dating, addiction, anxiety, and more.
“I started the project right after a break-up and found it to be really cathartic to write about how I was feeling at the time, the music just followed,” says Max of the album.
He continues, “I wanted change in my life, and I reflected that a bit through the music I was making. Over the course of the album, I started getting more comfortable singing, and although the album is not in chronological order, it’s easy to hear in some of the tracks when I become a bit more confident. This past year has been a very exciting one for me. Lots of ups and lots of downs, but the music has always been an up or me. Something I always go back to when I get that sinking feeling in my chest. And then when I listen back to some songs, it’s a cool reminder to myself that I got over these things that at first felt like huge problems. Now I’m already really excited to get started on the next project.” maxime.‘s debut album ‘whatevernowiscalled’ is out December 6th via AWAL.