Ben Kweller

In the organizer's words:

BEN KWELLER has been one of the defining voices of US indie rock for over two decades. His career began in the 1990s as a teenager with the Texan alternative band Radish, before he made his breakthrough in the early 2000s with his solo debut album Sha Sha. Since then, Kweller's style has moved effortlessly between indie rock, anti-folk, power pop and raw punk - always with an unmistakably autobiographical signature.

Over the course of his career, he has toured with artists such as Jeff Tweedy and, most recently, Ed Sheeran, and is now considered a permanent fixture on the indie scene. His songs oscillate between light and darkness, between playful lightness and existential heaviness - an aesthetic that he himself likes to describe with the symbols "skull and strawberry".

With his seventh studio album Cover the Mirrors, KWELLER is now opening a particularly personal chapter. The album will be released on May 30, 2025 - the 19th birthday of his late son Dorian - via his own label The Noise Company. The title refers to Jewish mourning rituals and symbolizes reflection, remembrance and self-examination.

Recorded in his home studio in Texas, close to the family gravesite, the album is an intense exploration of loss, love and moving on. Dorian, himself a musician under the name ZEV and on the verge of his own success, was killed in a car accident in 2023. Rather than retire, Kweller made a conscious decision to use music as a means of healing.

Musically, Cover the Mirrors combines intimate piano ballads with energetic rock. Songs such as "Trapped" - originally written by his son - or "Going Insane" process the pain directly. Other tracks open up new sonic spaces: "Depression" was created in collaboration with Coconut Records (Jason Schwartzman), "Killer Bee" with The Flaming Lips, and the final "Oh Dorian" featuring MJ Lenderman feels less like a farewell than a reunion.

As in earlier phases of his career, KWELLER deliberately draws on motifs from his own history. The album seems to come full circle: from his early days as a young musician to the father who lets his son live on in music.

Cover the Mirrors is therefore not just a mourning album, but a comprehensive self-portrait. For BEN KWELLER, music has always been a diary and life archive - and Dorian remains present in these songs.