Portland indie rock band Bonus Room will release their new single “Blessed Be” on October 9th, continuing the dark, playful energy that runs through their debut EP “Bunk,” due this fall. Today, we’re pleased to give you an early stream of the single, with a brand new music video!
The band formed during the pandemic as a mix of contrasting influences that collided in a shared basement studio known as the Starlight Underground. The lineup includes Chris Lee (vocals, guitar, keys, percussion), Derrin Brice (vocals, guitar, keys), guitarist and engineer Wes Phillips, bassist Erik Brownfield, and drummer Ben Dorothy.
Together they draw inspiration from acts like Fontaines D.C., Idles, and Modest Mouse, but also from artists as varied as Gorillaz and Talking Heads.
When Brice brought in “Blessed Be,” it was planted in personal reflection. “I wrote these lyrics when I was pondering conviction and faith,” he says. “My family is pretty much split in two, one side was a long line of pastors at christian churches and the other had more esoteric or agnostic beliefs. I have always found it interesting that they both gave me the tools to be a good person whilst condemning each other in how they went about it. Also my mom used to have a witchy bumper sticker that said ‘blessed be’ and I always thought it sounded cool.”
The song’s lyrics and tone reflect that duality — part spiritual, part sardonic — while the sound draws on a blend of surf tension and grimy post-punk drive. “When Derrin brought this song to the group, it was just a short instrumental sketch, a programmed beat,” Lee recalls. “He said his influence for the rhythm and feel was ‘Human Fly’ by The Cramps. It eventually evolved to be a bigger arrangement but we tried to keep the dark, gritty feeling that inspired it.”
“Blessed Be” became one of the most ambitious tracks on “Bunk,” both in sound and production. “Of all the songs on ‘Bunk,’ this one was the most challenging to record,” Lee says. “It’s just really really big and layered. Take note of the rhythm break about two-thirds of the way in. It’s my, and most people’s, favorite part of the song.”
The band’s “fun and brooding” aesthetic — a term Lee uses to describe their sound — ties together their contrasting backgrounds and ideas. “We had a bunch of influences when we first started hanging out and playing music, so it seemed like the project could go a bunch of different ways,” Brice explains. “Together, though, we channeled everyone from Gorillaz to Talking Heads, creating musical alchemy in the basement.”
That creative energy also shaped the title of their EP. “Bunk” traces back to a long chain of word associations — from memories of childhood sleepovers in a “bonus room” to a story about a political filibuster in Lee’s hometown of Buncombe County, North Carolina, where the term “bunk” was coined as an insult. The record ties these fragments together into something that sounds instinctive yet deliberate, unafraid to pull humor, grit, and contradiction into the same frame.
“Blessed Be” captures that blend really well — the haunted dance of belief and doubt, built on a rhythm that never stops moving forward.
