Chicano Batman

The fifth album from Chicano Batman, Notebook Fantasy takes its title from a phenomenon likely familiar to anyone who feels outside the status quo: the act of spending your formative years dreaming up other worlds and realities in the pages of a notebook, exploring those possibilities with a bold and wide-eyed freedom. Throughout the lifespan of the Los Angeles-bred band, vocalist/lyricist Bardo, guitarist Carlos Arévalo, and bassist Eduardo Arenas have followed their own visionary impulses to tremendous heights—a journey that began with taking the stage at local dive bars and recently saw them co-headlining the legendary Hollywood Bowl. In the making of Notebook Fantasy, Chicano Batman doubled down on their hyper-creative tendencies, discovering new dimensions of their prismatic musicality while infusing their lyrics with an unflinching honesty. With its dizzying constellation of song forms and sounds—including everything from arena-ready anthems to piano-driven balladry to psychedelic space odysseys—the result is a body of work that sheds all inhibitions and fully reveals the sublime expanse of their musical imagination.