Indie rock newcomer Speedrun (Nina Lüders) breaks out of Brooklyn with her exhilarating debut EP ‘Love’s Latest News,’ a dreamy, dynamic, and rip-roaring post-punk fever dream.
for fans of The Strokes, Phoenix, The Libertines, The Vaccines
Stream: ‘Love’s Latest News’ – Speedrun
“The lover is the loser; haven’t you heard?” Speedrun’s Nina Lüders sings at one point on her debut EP.
It’s a poetic and poignant line on a record full of intimate reflections and achy-hearted reckonings, speaking volumes to what it feels like to long for someone in silence; to feel so strongly, and be so totally helpless at the same time. Yet for all the frustration and pain love brings – and to be fair, there’s a lot of both – the hopeless romantics ultimately win out on Love’s Latest News, a fervent, emotionally charged indie rock record that basks in the deep end of passion.
it’s an unhappy ending
sounds like you’re leaving me
in a blue movie
your name crushes my teeth
i dream of your shoulders
your cigarette
rosemary eyes
nudie cutie
i’d die if you kissed me
nudie cutie, say to me
all the things that we could be
can i be closer to you?
Independently released February 24, 2024, Love’s Latest News is an invigorating introduction to an artist whose music is as exhilarating as her name suggests. The moniker for Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter Nina Lüders, Speedrun makes punchy post-punk for the 2020s: Her brand of indie rock is sonically sleazy and spirited, her gauzy guitars, radiant melodies, and fuzzy vocals evoking naughties indie progenitors like The Strokes and Phoenix – the very bands she grew up on.
“Speedrun is just me – with an emphasis on the parts of my brain that were grown by 2000s pop culture and indie rock,” Lüders explains. I wanted this project to feel like a fun safe haven for indie fans that emanates the comfort of nostalgia, while also being fresh and current-sounding.”
Working with producer Gordon Raphael (notable for producing The Strokes’ first three albums, as well as Regina Spektor’s major label debut Soviet Kitsch, among others), Lüders channeled her childhood influences into a record that pays homage to those artists and inspirations, all the while staying true to herself and finding her own artistic voice.
“Love’s Latest News as my debut EP includes the first song I ever wrote, as well as the most recent one – it’s a complete tapestry of my musical journey to date thus far,” she tells Atwood Magazine. “I wanted the theme of the EP to be centered around love as a concept and the way my relationship to it has changed over time. It’s mainly inspired by the medieval motifs of courtly love, chivalry, and heroic storytelling – hence me in the suit of armor!”
“I didn’t initially set out to make an EP at all – I’m a fairly new artist, so for my first songs I was going to just release sporadically as I wrote them. It’s not until I sort of compiled a bunch of ones I wrote that I realized there was a common thread in all the songs I was writing – love. From that point, I found that there was something true I could really say, observations I could make if I curated the themes and sounds a bit more sharply. From there, that’s where I began pulling the more medieval epic motifs – and then it became this really beautiful, fun project that I thought would be a great introduction to who I am as an artist: what inspires me and what I want to say to the world.”
Lüders candidly describes Love’s Latest News as nostalgic, introspective, and electric.
“I think it encapsulates the exact nature of what I want Speedrun to be: Insightful and relatable lyrics, punchy 2000s post-punk sound, and strong, vivid imagery,” she smiles. “ Intention is a huge part of my artistry – and I fueled everything I did with it when making this record. It’s scratchy, ethereal, hard, and sweet, and combines everything I love about music and writing into a neat little package to say, ‘Hey, welcome to my brain! Hope you enjoy your stay!’”
The EP’s title is itself an insightful glimpse into Lüders’ personality.
“Love’s Latest News is the translation of the title of a French poem from a book called A Matter of Blue by Jean-Michel Malpoix!” she explains. “I’m an avid reader, so I liked the idea of naming it after a poem in one of my favorite collections. In addition, the idea of love as something dynamic that always updates – like the news – was also a cool concept I wanted to integrate.”
From end to end, Speedrun’s debut EP is a dreamy, dynamic, and unrelenting indie rock fever dream.
Its songs are volatile and eruptive, full of tension and churn on one hand, confessional charm and captivating charisma on the other. Lüders holds nothing back energetically and emotionally, packing a punch while spilling her soul through these six tight, turbulent reveries. The journey from the rip-roaring opener “Hearsay” (an overdrive-drenched minute-and-change-long explosion) to the searing finale “Cruel Heart, Tender World” is full of memorable moments – from bouncy riffs that send shivers down the spine, to provocative lyrics that, well, send shivers down the spine. Must-hear highlights include the dramatic, beautifully poetic “Nudie Cutie” (“I make it day to day as pavement to your rain, and drink before sunrise your dandelion wine, a vision of your lips on the inside of my wrist…”) the intoxicating groove “What He’s Used To,” and the brooding slow-burn “Nosebleed Season” (from whence we get the aforementioned line, “The lover is the loser, haven’t you heard? It’s all true, my tongue burns like a fever and tilts my earth straight to you…”)
“My absolute favorites are ‘Nudie Cutie’ and ‘Cruel Heart, Tender World,’” Lüders says. “‘Nudie Cutie’ because it has my favorite lyrics that I’ve written, and “Cruel Heart” because it’s the only song on the record that is completely written and performed by only me – instrumentally, lyrically, and arrangement-wise.” As for her favorite lyrics, she cites lines from three different songs:
“In this holy hour / Angels, they carry me so closely but I still skin my knees” – “Daydream Delusion“
“I dream of your shoulders / your cigarette rosemary eyes” – “Nudie Cutie“
“Forget about the prophets of today / Why should we abide? / So easy to invent a God with softer ways” – “Cruel Heart, Tender World“
Love’s Latest News is admittedly just the beginning of Nina Lüders’ Speedrun, but she’s charged out of the gates at a breakneck speed – leaving us dazzled, dazed, and utterly enthralled.
“I hope people find some relatability in the challenges and topics evoked by the EP – from loneliness, to infatuation, to heartbreak – and enjoy a little slice of old-school indie. I would love both old and new indie fans to find something worthwhile in it, both lyrically and sonically,” Lüders shares.
“The creation process from start to finish has made me realize how far I have come as an artist in a short amount of time. It wouldn’t have been possible without all the amazing friends and musicians I’ve met during my journey, including my producer Frank Corr and legend Gordon Raphael (!!) – and for that, I am infinitely grateful. Love’s Latest News makes me excited to keep on writing and creating, and now that I’ve just started, my number one goal is to just get better and better from here on out. In a way, this EP is a love letter itself to the genre I’ve always loved most growing up – and I hope people who listen feel that love too!”
Experience the full record via our below stream, and peek inside Speedrun’s Love’s Latest News EP with Atwood Magazine as Nina Lüders goes track-by-track through the music and lyrics of their debut EP!
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:: stream/purchase Love’s Latest News here ::
:: connect with Speedrun here ::
Stream: ‘Love’s Latest News’ – Speedrun
:: Inside Love’s Latest News ::
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HEARSAY
“Hearsay” is the prologue of the Love’s Latest News odyssey, or the call to action – in this song I introduce love as the main motif of the EP. It’s a short and sweet intro where I juxtapose my own loneliness with familial love, posing the question “If I am the product of love, why do I feel incomplete?” It sets the stage for me to highlight the experience of being a child of immigrants in New York, being thankful for my family’s sacrifices to provide for me and my siblings, and yet reckoning with the guilt of constantly yearning for something more. In this sense, “achieving” or “aspiring” to romantic love is my version of the American Dream.
DAYDREAM DELUSION
The title and lyrics of “Daydream Delusion” are inspired by Richard Linklater’s 1995 film Before Sunrise, specifically one scene where a stranger reads aloud a poem to the two protagonists. The poem is about a speaker who desires to recognize oneself in the gaze of the other — I relate this motif to the song where, in commencing my quest for love, I find myself pining for that ultimate recognition, premodulated to meet the expectation of a future lover not yet to be realized. I point a finger into the open air and ask them “Where are you?”
NUDIE CUTIE
“Nudie Cutie” is about desire and romanticization. This song is meant to symbolize the all-too-familiar “honeymoon stage” of finding a lover: the frenzy of projecting our own ideals and iconographies onto a new person. In doing so, we create a false perfection that inevitably leads to self-imposed disappointment. In this part of the story, the lover is simply an “idea,” not a fully realized person with agency and complexities.
WHAT HE’S USED TO
In a continuation of “Nudie Cutie”’s set-up, this song explores that disappointment of confronting complexity in relationships – breaking the romantic “ideal” of how one finds a soulmate. In this one, I write about the story of a casanova on a regular night out. I wanted to branch into greater themes of our modern dating landscape, heteronormativity, and how societal pressures under a patriarchal system lead to harsh letdowns for both men and women. In keeping with the medieval theme, I wanted to narrate this one like a fable or fairytale, inspired by the story of Bluebeard – as if he were a “f**kboy” instead.
NOSEBLEED SEASON
“Nosebleed Season” is where I come to terms with the unpredictable, cruel nature of love – getting heartbroken and feeling defeated. “The lover is the loser,” indicates my disillusionment with finding true love, but life must go on. “I make do” is how I accept my pain, but I don’t let it consume me.
CRUEL HEART, TENDER WORLD
“Cruel Heart, Tender World” is the final, triumphant exodus of the EP – it’s primarily a track about self-love. I choose to celebrate romantics like myself: those akin to trying, failing, and then still having the strength to try again through loving oneself first. Just like in Before Sunrise, we come to the conclusion that the fruit of love lives not at a destination, but in the attempt. The hero’s journey ceases and begins again – this time, armed with self-love, stronger and happy at last.
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:: stream/purchase Love’s Latest News here ::
:: connect with speedrun here ::
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