Victorious Combinations

 After several years off the stage we are now booked to perform as the opener for The Aleatonics album release party December 1st at Lana Lou's .    Isabelle and I are rehearsing for our first show on stage in many years. Joining us is our long time friend Daniel Clement on guitar. We shall be debuting a few brand new songs and of course our latest single " Crazy Story ."  Speaking of Crazy Story, it's a pleasure to announce it has crossed 11 thousand plays on Spotify . The song has been added to a few popular playlists and it seems to be our most popular track to date. We are happy about that!  Our next single Rushes Over Me is about to be mastered and we need to figure out some kind of video for it next.  Many things happening right now and it's all feeling fun again! Thanks for reading, and hope you can make it down to Lana Lou's on Thursday December 1st!

 2022 has been a prolific year for us, I think the reality of Isabelle's recent health issue has really put us in the mindset to focus in on what counts. And it seems that music is essential to both of us!  At the start of 2021 I took over the former studio of Ryan Dahle in the East Van Song City building. I spent all my free time last year in the studio working on ideas. We have now been choosing from those songs and finalizing them. We Are Not Alone was the first one we finished because that one was almost the last song we wrote.  Crazy Story was the last song we wrote and it came together almost instantly, however it did take me months to figure out a part and learn how to tune a piano! The next song we're putting out is titled Rushes Over Me and is another from the group of songs we started last year. I pursued a series of trip hop type experiments and really invested into that darker groovy sound. Rushes Over Me started from a field recording of the air conditioni...

 We are really happy that our song "Crazy Story" was chosen as song of the day for the Earshot Distribution System.   We hope all of Canada starts listening to this one soon!  Thanks Earshot!

We are proud to announce our latest single " Crazy Story ," official release date is Sept 14th, 2022 Label: Boutique Empire, catalog number BE22052 The video below was filmed mostly at the Boutique Empire studio here in East Vancouver. There are a few segments that were videod around Vancouver, including a moment of live performance that was captured at the Isabelle Dunlop Clothing store on Main Street this spring.  Thanks to Seam McFarland for his camera work on that.  The rest of the clip features a heavily kaleidoscopic looking piano, the old Baldwin upright I inherited from my dearly departed and always missed friend Todd Simko. That piano took up a big part of the personality of this song and though it is quite a tricky thing to get or keep in tune it is very inspiring! Have a look and please let us know what you think of the song and video. We have been submitting our new singles to radio so if you have the will please try requesting it at a local station that might pla...

 Our dear friend, the always brilliant and affable Robert Edmonds, has created this artwork for our new single "Crazy Story". Crazy Story - Combine the Victorious - Robert Edmonds artwork The artwork was inspired from a random top-of-her-head thought that Isabelle dropped in the middle of telling us a funny story while we sat in front of Cascade in the sunshine having a pint. Rob caught it and came up with this. I can't wait to print t-shirts. Thank you once again Rob Edmonds!! We love it! The single drops on Sept 14th 2022.

Crazy Story is one of the last songs that Isabelle and I wrote together over the winter. In 2021 we created an album's worth of material which we are this year putting together to release one song at a time. Our Love Is Stronger than some Crazy Story is probably the best collaboration the two of us have done since we began writing together in 2006!    In the Autumn of 2021 I was determined to create either a new song or at least a new loop everytime I went into the studio without a client. I had been studio maintenance and fixing things one afternoon and hadn't really done any creative work that day. However I had been listening to random songs on Spotify while I was cleaning up and I got inspired by the vibe of one song. Rather than simply copy it - which is of course illegal - I challenged myself to create something that felt similar but wasn't actually the same. It all started with a kick drum pattern honestly.  From there the beat came together pretty effortlessly an...

  Isabelle and I are very excited to release our next single. We Are Not Alone was initially inspired from a day spent on the water whale watching last September as part of a birthday present for Isabelle! While we where out there the magnitude of the animals in the water, and the sheer vastness of the ocean all around us and the seemingly infinite horizon really made an impression on me. Perhaps this was due to spending so much time inside over the past couple covid years.  As our ferry returned from Vancouver Island and the city of Vancouver slowly began to appear as a tiny dot on the shoreline I was hit again with the scale of the world and how self absorbed I had been over the past decades. All my life was contained in a dot on the horizon and seemed so huge while we were there. Yet the moment we left the city the whole world began to filter into my consciousness. After getting back that weekend Isabelle and I went into the studio and We Are Not Alone was born.  Pete...

 We are very pleased to announce that we have a new album about to drop!   Paros is a collection of remixes, remasters, and new tracks (including Façon Fashion , the song made popular on the Netflix series Tiny Pretty Things ) being released on Thorvald Records, April 29th. The anthology is curated and directed by Thorvald Record label chief, record producer and impresario Stefan Sigerson .  We have collaborated for over a decade on songs, dating back to our Crumbling Hearts ep, where he co-produced and co-wrote several tracks. His support over the years has always been uplifting and inspiring, so it's exciting to launch this package out to the world with his new label's guidance and assistance!  A wonderful surprise from this venture has been the connection with graphic artist Steven R Gilmore . (famous for branding Nettwerk Records, Steven was the graphic artist on the 1988 After All album, as well as the debut Pure album Pureafunalia .)   He has created ...

    Love Ballad (Official Video)    We are quite pleased to present out new video, Love Ballad filmed on location at Isabelle's shop, the Isabelle Dunlop Clothing Store. The video is a literal depiction of a day in the life of Combine the Victorious' singer and independent clothing designer Isabelle Dunlop featuring Carmel Amit as the loyal customer!  Video produced by Boutique Empire Directed and Edited by HENNING Camera operators: Mark R Henning, Isabelle Dunlop   Isabelle Dunlop Clothing Store 4158 Main Street, Vancouver BC

  Love Ballad / Thunder  double A-side Our first release partnered with Thorvald Records Artwork by Stephen R Gilmore Produced by Henning at Boutique Empire Studio Recorded at Boutique Empire and Hipposonic Studios Listen on  Spotify Apple Music Tidal

Hello! Isabelle here. Just wanted to share a little bit about our song Thunde r from the lyrical perspective.  The lyrics for Thunder were born from an idea sparked at my studio at the shop, the hum of the sewing machine plain to hear in the backdrop of my original voice memo. “I’m feeling you, it’s coming through like thunder” I've often found that as I sew or iron away my mind can drift off into analyzing conversations and moments that have been caught in my head. Last summer we were in the process of moving from our home of 24 years and I realize that I was kind of saying goodbye to that place. It had always been such a safe, protective and creative space. It was like losing a friend. The same as with friendship there is an ebb and flow as we need it and it’s okay when things change, in fact it’s completely natural. As we walk away from an old home I feel no pain because I believe in the new adventure and all that it holds. The cool thing is that I played the nugget ...