US ‘90s goth alumni Sunshine Blind reveal Unreleased demos
In 2023, US nineties goth alumni Sunshine Blind announced that they had begun writing new material together for the first time in many years, and in December 2024 the band reunited to play their first live show in six years, at The Red Party in New York’s Mercury Lounge. While reviving the writing machine again, co-founders and co-writers Caroline Blind (vocals, lyrics) and CWHK (guitars, bass, programming, misc.) unearthed a number of old DAT mixdown tapes from the vaults of nineteen-ninety-something. After ordering a used DAT machine online to check the tapes out, they found the unreleased demo track ‘Tomorrow’, along with an early demo version of ‘Hanging Lake’. These two gems have been released today (Monday 21 July 2025) as Unreleased Vol 1, while the newer recordings are still being finished up. Caroline explains:
“In preparation for the release of new music, we ran across a lot of old material and demos that never saw the light of day. We thought we would release them as an interesting behind the scenes look into our songwriting process. We hope fans will enjoy hearing these demos from the 1990s, and we look forward to releasing the new songs we’ve been working on soon.”
Formed in New Jersey and later based in San Francisco, Sunshine Blind were originally active from 1991-2004, disbanding when the husband-and-wife duo of Caroline Blind and CWHK parted ways. During that time, they produced three studio albums: Love the Sky to Death (1995), Liquid (1997), and I Carry You (2003). The band gigged and toured around the US with the likes of The Wake, Faith and the Muse, and Switchblade Symphony among others; became regular fixtures at early Convergence festivals; and ventured to the UK and Europe for appearances at Whitby Goth Weekend and Wave-Gotik-Treffen.
The live band later reunited occasionally for special one-off shows between 2010 and 2018, joined by original drummer Geoff Bruce (later of Faith and the Muse, Christ vs. Warhol), and enlisting longtime friend and co-conspirator William Faith on bass (Faith and the Muse, The Bellwether Syndicate, Rozz Williams, Mephisto Walz, et al). With members now based between New Jersey, San Francisco, and Chicago, the same lineup reconvened for the band’s most recent homecoming show in NYC.
In the interim, Caroline Blind embarked on a solo career, releasing her debut album The Spell Between in 2020, and becoming one half of Voidant alongside Dave ‘Wolfie’ Wolfenden of Red Lorry Yellow Lorry. On the return to collaborating as Sunshine Blind in 2023, Caroline said:
“After wandering the musical (and geographical) landscape for many years, experimenting with new modalities and lineup configurations, it seems we both came full circle: the opportunity to go back to where it all began, and to write a couple of Sunshine Blind songs. I don't know if there was anything to the timing, besides both of us exhausting our searches for people to fill the roles that we each played for the other in the past. Even though we live in different states, we can write and record through the magic of technology, and so far, it's going well!”
Unreleased Vol 1 from Sunshine Blind is out now as a digital download on Bandcamp, and streaming from Spotify and all the usual digital music stores.
