Pansy started as Vivian McCall’s solo project.


Vivian established her career as a multi-instrumentalist and recording engineer with Chicago’s off-kilter retro pop band Jungle Green. After years of engineering sessions for her bandmates, and recording a Jungle Green album with Foxygen’s Jonathan Rado, she recorded Pansy on her Tascam 488 tape machine. In taking a lo-fi emotional inventory of her transition, Vivian drew from the music that helped her endure it: The Magnetic Fields, Liz Phair, and the eclectic punk of New Zealand’s Dunedin sound.

Shortly after releasing Pansy, Vivian moved to Seattle, where the band became a bona fide four-piece with guitarist Liz Perlman, drummer MJ Harbarger, and bassist Syd Brownstone. Pansy is about coming out.

The Skin Graft EP is about trying to live a normal life as a trans woman in America, where the political temperature is rising.

PRAISE FOR PANSY

✦ “Lead single “Mercy, Kill Me” is one of the best successors to “Sparky’s Dream” I’ve encountered recently. But “Mercy, Kill Me” isn’t just excellent pop-rock, it’s a lyrical balm for trans folks looking for a story like their own… The song feasts on a hook you’d need a lobotomy to forget.” [Paste]

✦ “[Skin Graft] is a strong set of classic indie rock with a power-pop touch that closes out with a pair of more tender, sparse, folky tunes.” [KEXP]

✦ “Seattle power-pop janglers resurrect mercurial guitar, big melodies, and oceanic dynamics as heirs of Big Star, Boston and Gin Blossoms… They seem in no hurry to release an album but check this out in the hope it gives them a nudge.” [NZListener]

✦ “Pansy makes every note count on one of the year’s standout short-format releases” [Add to Want List]

✦ “‘Dark Star’ finds the band settling in for a simmering, folk-tinged slow-burn, letting the track gradually transform from a solitary confessional into a spikey and turbulent storm of guitar feedback… The results are equal parts anxious and entrancing, bolstering McCall’s elliptical song structure with sweeping and satisfying waves of distortion.” [Under the Radar Mag]

✦ “Ultimately, this EP serves as a grower, likely to resonate with a profound sense of meaning for anyone willing to invest time in it.” [JanglePopHub]

✦ “Really striking power pop songs are few and far between of late, but the best ones I’ve been listening to come from Pansy.” [Austin Town Hall]

✦ “Pansy: an intimate and ultimately playful look at what it means to understand yourself, this lo-fi record reaches out for reason and finds its own hand.” [Secret Meeting]

✦ “The hush description of discontent in McCall’s voice lends to its lo-fi bedroom lullaby sound; the drifting synthesizer melodies, mixed with varying track speeds off McCall’s Tascam 488 tape machine, emit the sensation of floating.” [Riot Fest]

✦ “Listening to the album feels like being home for the fall holidays ––it’s jarring and eye-opening, but also comforting and familiar. It’s like walking on the cobblestone of your college campus and finally being happy with the life you have created for yourself.” [Heart Eyes Magazine]

✦ “Through Pansy, McCall shares how she reconnected with herself throughout her transition, and parses the highs and lows of embracing her vulnerability.” [Also Cool Magazine]

✦ “Influenced by the raw textures of lofi-punk, multi-instrumentalist and producer Pansy walks the line between profound honesty and simplistic spontaneity.” [Basement Magazine]

✦ “Pansy’s new track “Woman of Ur Dreams” is wonderfully jangly and well structured to effervesce soulful and spellbinding sound. Recorded on vintage equipment to tape, the lo fi sound is solidified and visceral.” [American Pancake]

✦ “The track shines with enchanting and sincere melodies and a nostalgic pop hit vibe.” [Grotesqualizer’s Choice Capsule]

✦ “Vivian McCall nibbles at Surf rock , grabs at post-punk and engulfs it all in spindly, anxious jangled riffs.” [JanglePopHub]

✦ “Just imagine a really young Elvis hanging out and recording in a bedroom on a 4 track, and well, that’s what you get here…” [Austin Town Hall]

✦ “Production-wise the song is left out of time with no clear indicator as to what era it might belong to. Simple drumming and clear, folky guitar lines weave throughout the song. The Velvet Underground may not have sold many records, but they are continuing to inspire outstanding new artists.” [In a world without Lou Reed]

✦ “Hints—blending the apparent if not disparate influences of The Magnetic Fields and Sonny Smith filtered through the language of ’60s pop-rock—there’s an undeniable sense of comfort in these recordings.” [Flood Magazine]

✦ “The long standing member of Jungle Green has taken off on her own to continue the genre exploration and invention as a bad ass solo musician.” [Chicago Crowd Surfer]