What have you awakened?
Cuz I’m already already gone
Sometimes you catch yourself talking about a place in the past tense while you’re still sitting in it. Your coat is on the hook and the sunlight falls across the wall at its usual hour, but you’ve rehearsed leaving so often that the room has begun to feel like a memory. In Waiting, Madison, Wisconsin darkwave artist Carrellee weighs the time she’s lost to worry against the risk of putting her heart on the line again. She asks what someone has awakened in her and hears herself answer that she’s already gone. The second “already” sounds like the moment she realizes she means it.
The bass is already moving when she starts to sing. A springy synth figure doubles back on itself before the kick lands, and rippling synths gather behind her as bell tones ring between lines. Carrellee keeps her voice close, with the silky composure of Curve’s Toni Halliday and some of the frank sensuality of Sinéad O’Connor’s “I Want Your (Hands on Me).” The synth layers have the glossy sweep of Madonna’s Ray of Light.
Carrellee made that turn toward late-’90s and early-’00s techno and dance pop in Madison, where she wrote, performed, and produced the single. She brought back Maurizio Baggio (The Soft Moon, Boy Harsher) to mix and Josh Bonati (Adrianne Lenker) to master. Both worked on her self-titled 2025 album for Young & Cold Records.
Carrellee shot and directed the video herself, too, giving it the close framing and everyday details of a home movie. She lies among fallen leaves, sings beside a backyard grill with the wind pushing her hair across her eyes, and stretches her arms wide in front of shelves packed with records. By the water, the sun turns her into a silhouette. When the camera returns to the leaves, the ground is empty, as though the image has finally caught up with the refrain.
Watch the video for “Waiting” below.
Carrellee spent years performing as a folk artist before she turned to darkwave. Her 2022 debut, Scale of Dreams, sold out its first pressing on Negative Gain Productions, and No Coast Records put it back in print. She took those songs to Chicago’s Cold Waves, Vancouver’s Verboden, and a Synthicide night at Brooklyn’s Saint Vitus. On Rescaled, she handed them over to remixers including Patriarchy, Casket Cassette, and former Smashing Pumpkins guitarist Jeff Schroeder.
Touring brought her to IAMX, first as an opener in the Midwest in 2023 and then as a backing vocalist and synth player on European and North American dates in 2024 and 2025. Back in the studio, she brought in Matia Simovich and Ryan McCambridge for additional production on her self-titled second album. The record gave her a breakout single in “Captain,” earned airplay on KEXP, and reached the top ten of the Deutsche Alternative Charts. IAMX, INHALT, and Bragolin later reworked songs from it for a remix EP.
In 2026, Carrellee headlined a 30-date U.S. tour and returned to Verboden. Her collaboration with Bragolin extended beyond the remix. She sang on “Feel This Flame Unfold” from the Dutch darkwave project’s I Don’t Like What It Does to Me, and the labelmates co-headlined a North American run this fall. Carrellee will open for Bragolin on all 21 dates of their next run, which starts November 12 at Glasgow’s Ivory Blacks and marks her first European tour under the Carrellee name.
“Waiting” is out now. Order the single on Bandcamp.
Carrellee’s 2026 European tour with Bragolin
- Nov. 12 — Glasgow, UK — Ivory Blacks
- Nov. 13 — Manchester, UK — Grafton Arms
- Nov. 15 — London, UK — Camden Barfly
- Nov. 19 — Berlin, Germany — Urban Spree
- Nov. 21 — Weissenhäuser Strand, Germany — Plage Noire Festival
- Nov. 25 — Graz, Austria — PPC Graz
- Nov. 26 — Budapest, Hungary — Robot Budapest
- Nov. 27 — Vienna, Austria — The Chamber
- Nov. 28 — Augsburg, Germany — Rockfabrik
- Nov. 29 — Cologne, Germany — Blue Shell
- Dec. 1 — Karlsruhe, Germany — Die Stadtmitte
- Dec. 3 — Rüsselsheim, Germany — Das Rind
- Dec. 4 — Essen, Germany — Kulturzentrum Grend
- Dec. 5 — Bremen, Germany — Lila Eule
- Dec. 6 — Bielefeld, Germany — Movie
- Dec. 8 — Prague, Czech Republic — Café v Lese
- Dec. 9 — Brno, Czech Republic — Art Bar
- Dec. 11 — Barcelona, Spain — Sala Wolf
- Dec. 12 — Madrid, Spain — Sala Nazca
- Dec. 17 — Paris, France — Le Chinois
- Dec. 19 — Brussels, Belgium — mOtown Concerts
Find ticket information for the European tour here.
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