Simplon UP:
Jellephant & The Phantoms + Car Pets

Jellephant & The Phantoms is a garage band from Arnhem, the Netherlands. With inspirations such as Cloud Nothings, Jay Reatard and Sonic Youth and new band players (also members that can be known from the band Paracetamøl), the band sounds fiercer than ever. Jelle Haagsma has already released 12 albums under the name Jellephant. Some albums contain dreamy shoegaze, others noisy garage, but also psychedelic 60s songs or small acoustic songs are part of his oeuvre. Jellephant’s latest soloalbum is called ‘Where’s the Fire’ and is complemented by vocals by Tessa van Raalte, who is also a guitarist in Jellephant & The Phantoms.

Jellephant almost always performs live with his band, ‘The Phantoms’. The band recorded the album ‘Spills’ together and released it in 2021. This album was described by the magazine Muziscene as one of the best guitar records of the moment from Dutch soil in this genre, due to the combination of rawness with catchy melodies: Jellephant & The Phantoms combines a punk attitude with musicality. In short, you don’t want to miss their performance at UP!

Car Pets is a Dutch indie-rock band from Utrecht that is always trying to surprise the listener and themselves with their music. The band consists of three members: Niek Pronk, Tijmen Ruizendaal & Paul Rijnbeek. They use drums, guitar, synthesizer and bass (and in the song Metal Metal Steel also a vacuum cleaner) to get their sound across. As soon as they hit something funny, melodic or idiotic during their weekly jam-sessions, they press record on their laptop and capture whatever they come up with in that moment. They get the biggest kick in trying to replicate a ‘mistake’ and make that the main hook of a song. If a song is going on for too long or gets too predictable, they immediately challenge themselves to come up with a quirky new melody or time signature.

This process leads to songs that tend to be short, but packed with ideas and excitement. Excentric vocals and experimental songs with a dark edge are typical for the band. They get some inspiration from bands like Parquet Courts, Black Lips and Parcels. However, band member Niek Pronk once said that Car Pets doesn’t try to make the same music as their inspirations, but that for example Parquet Courts seems to have a lot of fun while making and playing their music. Car Pets wants, and is doing a great job, to convey that same type of enthusiasm for their own music that they love, to their audience.