Jenn performs a Lucy Valentine show at Baby Doll, a newly opened live music venue in western Seoul, May 11. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar
It's always tough loving foreign music acts in Korea, because someone inevitably leaves the country. The local underground music scene's latest casualty is Lucy Valentine, whose lead guitarist and vocalist Jenn is moving back to the United States in a couple weeks.
"Korea has been my home for the past three years," Jenn told The Korea Times. "I moved just after I finished school, and I'm grateful for the experiences that I've had, but I want to try living and working in the States. It's been a lot of fun, and I've gotten the chance to try a lot of new things."
The band has one final Korea show on Saturday and may even release another mini-album in time.
Jenn first appeared on the stage here when she joined the oi! punk band Oily Rag. She also played in the band Sour Mango before starting Lucy Valentine in 2022, shortly after the first Block Party festival. They recorded a demo at the Phillies Basement prior to its closing and relocating to a new building without a good basement. Jenn also joined the hardcore band Polluter briefly last year, playing at IT'S A FEST! 2023 before the band broke up.
Jenn made a strong impression in her few years here, and Lucy Valentine became known for its dreamy, gothy, shoegazy sound, which the band's Instagram profile describes as "fever dream background music." Its current lineup includes Ali on bass and Mati on drums.
She recalled Lucy Valentine playing a Halloween show at Docking Around, a bar run by Echo and the Machine and Goth Korea. And in January, the burlesque performer Vendetta Van Doll used Jenn as a "victim" during a House of Hex performance.
"It felt liberating to perform an identity that I'm ordinarily encouraged to obscure and be praised for it," she said of the experience. "I think there's a lot of value in allowing yourself to spiral and feel the outer extremities of your emotional range."
The band has had a good run of shows in the last few months, playing in venues across Korea in Incheon, Suwon and Busan, where their bassist lives.
The three members of Lucy Valentine pose after a show outside Baby Doll, a newly opened live music venue in western Seoul, May 11. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar
Lucy Valentine, and its mesmerising frontwoman, have been described frequently as goth, which isn't the worst label although it also isn't something the members claim hard.
"I like trad goth stuff like Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure as well as more recent groups like Boy Harsher, She Past Away and Molchat Doma," Jenn said. "But I think it would be hard to classify me as goth specifically because I love rock and heavy music. I love Boris, Swans and Chelsea Wolfe, and I learned how to play guitar from playing along to Black Sabbath and Alice in Chains."
After this final show, Lucy Valentine may still continue. Jenn is the heart of Lucy Valentine, and it goes where she goes.
"Last summer, I visited San Diego to see my friends Lucas and Aaron, and we played a few shows as Lucy Valentine," she said. "We played someone's house party. They set us up on this gigantic balcony high up off the ground, overlooking the hills. The women on the balcony behind us told us they were witches. We managed to get through almost all the songs in the set before the host was like, 'This music is a little weird. Could you play Led Zeppelin instead?' We were like, 'No, we can't,' and stopped the set. Later on the trip, we decided we wanted to play in the desert, so we just drove out with all our gear and set up among the huge rocks. We played as the sun set behind us and wandered around in the darkness."
The poster for Lucy Valentine's final show this Saturday / Courtesy of Lucy Valentine
Jenn made it clear that this visit was instrumental in calling her back to her homeland. It also seems likely she'll resume her Stateside lineup for Lucy Valentine, and she's already thinking about ideas for the next chapter.
"I would love to take a heavier direction with Lucy Valentine and make songs a little more similar to what I was making just before I moved to Korea," she said. "I remember explaining to my friend Lucas the vibe I wanted for the song we were making, like, 'Play like slime is dripping down the walls. Slowly and ominously.' I'm gifting him a double pedal when we play together again. A metal band left one at my parents' house when I threw a house show in high school. I can dig through my graveyard of shredded bass bows and broken pedals to find it."
Lucy Valentine's final show starts this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the newly opened venue Baby Doll in western Seoul's Sinchon. Entry costs 10,000 won. Also playing are electronic/post-rock band Cloud Underground and stoner/desert rock band Peju. Visit lucyvalentine.bandcamp.com to listen, and follow @lucyvalentineband on Instagram.