Premiere: "How It Ends," An Enchanting Forecast of Doom from Lunch Duchess

Just when you thought you were out, baroque-pop outfit Lunch Duchess pulls you back in with their second single of July, “How It Ends,” and its accompanying music video.

Their last drop, “Perfection,” was the group’s first release since mid-2019 when they published their first LP, “Crying for Fun.” In comparison with many of the songs off that record, “Perfection” is noticeably poppier with a bouncing bassline, spacey guitars, and bubbly vocals. Conversely, “How It Ends” is arguably their darkest work yet.

Lyrically, this song is a stark look at the present and future humanity faces. Corporate oligarchies, environmental destruction, and consumerist culture are addressed plainly as grim reminders that life on Earth is not looking so hot at the moment.

Lines like “Twenty-tens were torture, but the next ten will be worse” are hard to stomach, to say the least. But they’re juxtaposed by the whimsical instrumentation and Katharine Seggerman’s glossy vocals. There’s also some playful piano thrown in to further emphasize the contrast. The semi-despondent guitar part, briefly isolated towards the end, really pulls together the whole smiling-through-the-pain tone of the track.

Of course, Michael Jensen’s glitchy pixel art is a perfect visual companion for the song. We watch an older man in a cowboy hat do a little dance at the forefront of a green pasture that slowly decays, consumed by fire and rot until the landscape is charred and barren beneath a crimson sky. It’s a simple, but effective showcase of how we as a species have gleefully disregarded our environment.

Be sure to keep an eye out for the upcoming Lunch Duchess EP, “How It Ends,” which is due out on August 12.