Ghost mouse running all around
And now dead in the ground
We plot, we plan, we pencil things in…and life, impish and indifferent, scrawls chaos across the calendar. Kenny Becker of Goon arrived at the studio armed with intention: an album in hand, time booked, tone set. But then came the rupture. A marriage collapsed, leaving Becker gut-punched, adrift in a blur of heartbreak and psychic static. Joy soured, and the songs he’d written began to ache.
“I began this record so excited,” says Becker. “The songwriting was less scripted, letting me loosen up the reins a little and follow whatever idea seemed most interesting. It started off as a really joyful recording process. Then came the most devastating time of my life.”
Rather than retreat, Becker leaned into the fracture, twisting the compositions through the dissonance, dragging the band through uncharted emotional backroads. The result is Dream 3, a record less about recovery than recognition of the quiet wreckage that remains after the wind leaves the sails, of finding strange solace in the mess.
Closer To stumbles into the thick of things: Andy Polito’s drums strike like dull thunder, shoving the track forward while Dillon Peralta’s guitars slink and spiral, lost in their own loops. The piece climbs and convulses, teeters toward collapse, then dissolves into a narcotic murk. Still, melody lingers – threadbare, stubborn, strung tight. Kenny Becker’s voice isn’t desperate, it’s drained, dogged, deadpan, the sound of someone murmuring through the fog with nowhere left to turn but forward. Imagine Liz Phair’s gentle slouch, Elliott Smith’s sting, The Breeders’ smirk, and the Dandy Warhols’ daze…Closer To would swan dive into that same 90s slipstream, barefoot and bemused.
Lyrically, it’s less a story than a fever dream: sunlight sullies into dread, jaws glint, ghost mice dash, and seraphim watch from somewhere beyond knowing. Scum floats. Rituals rot. Memory laps at the edge of myth. Everything alive inches closer to its expiry date.
The song comes with a trippy, psychedelic visualizer:
Goon took root in 2015 as the bedroom-bound vision of singer and multi-instrumentalist Kenny Becker, who assembled Dusk of Punk, a homespun EP that compiled his best early recordings. That solo flicker soon flared into full-band formation, culminating in the debut LP Heaven is Humming, released via Partisan Records in 2019. After reshuffling the lineup (Andy Polito on drums, Dillon Peralta on guitar, Tamara Simons on bass) Becker and co. self-released Paint By Numbers 1, followed by the lush, slow-blooming Hour of Green Evening and the Red Ladder EP in 2022. Touring hard, they shared stages with the likes of Built to Spill, Jadu Heart, Slow Pulp, Teethe, and Squirrel Flower before landing with Philadelphia’s Born Losers Records.
With Claire Morison at Wild Horizon Sound in Los Angeles, Goon began to bend inward. The result: an album shadowed by personal upheaval and planetary disarray, yet shot through with baseball, aliens, and Tony Soprano. A strange, stained bloom born from collapse.
Dream 3 is out July 11, 2025 on Born Losers Records. Listen to Closer To below and pre-order the album here. You can pre-order the vinyl version here.
Goon will be going on tour throughout the US this June, sharing stages with Preoccupations. Get tickets here.
06/07/25 Seattle, WA @Madame Lou’s
06/08/25 Portland, OR @Polaris Hall
06/10/25 San Francisco, CA @Rickshaw Stop
06/12/25 Los Angeles, CA @Lodge Room
06/13/25 San Diego, CA @Casbah
06/14/25 Pioneertown, CA @Pappy + Harriet’s
06/17/25 Austin, TX @Parish
06/18/25 Denton, TX @Rubber Gloves
06/20/25 Nashville, TN @The Blue Room-Third Man Records
06/21/25 Atlanta, GA @The Masquerade(Purgatory)
06/22/25 Raleigh, NC @Kings
06/24/25 Washington, DC @Songbyrd Record Cafe
06/25/25 Philadelphia, PA @Johnny Brenda’s
06/27/25 New York, NY @Bowery Ballroom
06/29/25 Cambridge, MA @Middle East Upstairs
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