LOS ANGELES, CA- I first caught Starling live at The Echoplex during Echo Park Rising in 2024, and they’ve been on my radar ever since. Back then, it was their track “I Want To” that grabbed me—intimate, restrained, and emotionally resonant. But with each new release, the Los Angeles alt-rock outfit has continued to sharpen their identity. Their latest single, “I Can Be Convinced,” from the upcoming Forgive Me EP (out June 27 via Sunday Drive Records), may be their most compelling evolution yet.
From the jump, the song is a study in contrast. Bandleader Kasha Souter Willett’s delicate, breathy vocals float over an arrangement that grows increasingly chaotic. What starts out sweet and lilting builds toward a full-blown sonic tempest—soaring guitars, relentless hi-hats, and a wall of sound that feels like it just might collapse in on itself. But it never does. That’s the trick. Kasha’s vocals tether the whole thing together, offering a kind of emotional gravity that lets the chaos orbit around it.
“I Can Be Convinced” isn’t just sonically compelling—it’s thematically rich, too. The band describes the song as “smothered… wrapped up in a warm blanket so tightly you cannot move.” It’s about needing to be held in place, to surrender to someone else’s containment, and to find strange comfort in that confinement. Kasha originally envisioned the track as something quieter, sadder—but the full band pushed it into upbeat territory. That juxtaposition, that tension between lyrical yearning and high-octane instrumentation, is exactly why it works.
Visually, the band nails it too. The video looks like it was torn from a dream set somewhere in the mid-90s. Directed by David Milan Kelly and filmed in Los Angeles, it features an ensemble of ballerinas and vintage-tinged textures that feel more 120 Minutes than TikTok. From the thrifted oversized white skirt Kasha wears to the dancers learning poses on the fly, there’s a spontaneity and sincerity to it that perfectly matches the song’s emotional temperature. I have no idea what kind of budget Starling was working with , but they accomplish here is impressive. The visual polish, the conceptual coherence, and the performance energy all signal a band that knows exactly who they are and what they’re trying to say.
With a new EP on the way (Forgive Me drops June 27), Starling seems to be… at least my humble opinion… carving out space as one of the more exciting voices in the local alt-rock scene.
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