How Tempe band Alison's Halo became part of the shoegaze revival

Alison's Halo never planned to hop aboard the nostalgia train.

"No, this is the first time since 1996," says guitarist/singer Adam Cooper about the band's level of activity. "We had an invitation to play a couple shows on the West Coast out of the blue. We've been fielding offers like that over the last few years, but they weren't big enough shows to warrant it."

The foursome (rounded out by singer/guitarist Catherine Cooper, bassist/vocalist David Roger and drummer-percussionist Roger Brogan) formed in Tempe's burgeoning '90s scene. They gained steady buzz despite releasing one (post-breakup) LP, 1998's "Eyedazzler." There have been songs released via compilations in the interim, but they were happy to leave Alison's Halo in the '90s. Until the future came calling.

"Things just coalesced between Spotify, YouTube and TikTok," Catherine Cooper says. "We just were seeing numbers that were going up higher and higher. We were contacted by a management company and they wanted to have a talk and figure out if we could jump on tour with Panchiko and make it a bigger event than what we were planning."

So what's it like to be part of the shoegaze "revival" happening among Gen Z? A touch peculiar, apparently.

"I don't know if I could really quantify it. It's not our world," Adam Cooper says. "It's not a place we inhabit very much. But when I start hearing the friends of our kids mentioning, 'Oh, that's your parents' band?' There's a lot of weird degrees of separation that keep getting tighter all the time."

He adds, "In certain circles, our name gets mentioned enough and our record gets enough plays. But now, it seems to have exploded. There's a lot of heart-on-sleeve going on with younger kids. These kids are just experiencing life for the first time after having their life on pause for a while."

It's not just Gen Z; This "return" has actually been percolating this whole time.

"I think it's always been bubbling up," Adam Cooper says. "There were various points along the line where we could have gotten back together easily. But maybe the interest was at 50, 60 percent. And if you're going to do it, you may as well do it right."

And now's the time to truly do it right — aside from a U.S. tour with Panchiko (running through the fall), they've booked local gigs (including a Nov. 7 show at Valley Bar) and even Texas' Levitation festival in late October.

"Everything around the shows and around the industry is so much more professional now," Adam Cooper says. "From booking to promotion, it's actually improved. Maybe social media's put a spotlight on the shadiness of the industry and it's shaped it up a bit. But we feel a lot more comfortable going because we've had some really questionable experiences in the past."

Despite their initial hesitance, the band recognize that the attention is novel enough.

"It's pretty rare in any industry for someone to call you back when you're in your mid-50s," Adam Cooper says. "That just doesn't happen in a lot of other arenas — somebody saying, 'Hey, we really liked what you did 30 years ago; can you come back and do it again?'"

If anything, there's a level of vindication involved.

"It's just always been there, and we've always had a connection to it and saying, 'That's great, because we didn't get any attention (back then), so we'll take whatever we can get," Catherine Cooper says. "So at this point, we're just so happy that it's reaching so many people that are becoming fans. It's the nature of social media these days that bands like us, who got shrugged away and just really never got anywhere but had critical success, we're able to get it out there a little bit more."

The real reward, though, is that each member is better able to accept and appreciate what all this attention and buzz means for them personally and creatively.

"I think with a little bit of age on our side, there's a little bit more confidence than what we had before," Catherine Cooper says. "We were just really young and super-nervous kids and really everyone in the band can be introverts for the most part. So I think we're bringing that to these shows, just a little bit more confidence. We believe in these songs."

It's not just confidence, but an even more organic connection to the music.

"I'm so pleased these songs held up that I can still tolerate and listen to them," Adam Cooper says. "We've probably played the songs more in the past three or four months gearing up for these shows than we ever did before. We have a different level of discipline, too. We're having infinitely more fun than we did back in the day because we were just worried about even pulling them off at the point."
In fact, revisiting this music has been a chance to reconnect with their younger selves.

"As far as guitar playing, I'd hope we were a little bit better musicians at this point," Adam Cooper says. "We were just winging it in practice because they were, after all, just demos. So we threw caution to the wind and basically did a lot of improv. I think we overreached our capabilities in writing them originally. And so now I think that matches up. We're actually on the same playing field as the songs."

It's also been an opportunity to fully understand why this music has resonated with kids in 2024.

"Some of it's really universal because obviously it's connecting with a lot of younger kids," Adam Cooper says. "I don't know if it was hopelessness at the time. I don't know if it was a touch of depression. Life's a little harder for kids today and they relate to some of the lyrics."

Ultimately, it's been four friends trying (and generally succeeding) to reconnect as if the last 30 years hadn't happened.

"We're in a place now where we're just really happy to be able to come back to this work and fill it out and create more," Catherine Cooper says. "We can do some new special things that we always wanted to do and just didn't have time to do. We've always known when the four of us get together in a room, that something always happens."

It's this cohesive connection that made their reunion so much more achievable.

"We had a band meeting (recently), and we (mentioned) that we were all feeling a little apprehensive because we haven't really spent any time with each other probably for 20 years," Catherine Cooper says. "But we all got together and it was like no time passed. It's just like we hit the ground running, and everyone was on the same page and just joking around. So that was a super positive experience and that made us just like go full steam ahead with it."

Truly, some of that "mental" stuff was the only real obstacle.

"Meeting with the band and getting together and playing the songs, they've always been at the forefront of our minds," Adam Cooper says. "So it's not like we really had a gap away from music. I mean, we didn't play for a long time, but that's easily solved."
As confident as the band are, some questions/concerns remain. Namely, what happens when some of your audience wasn't even alive circa 1996?

"We really didn't have that much material that was released," Adam Cooper says. "But now that they're out there, what we're really anticipating or curious about is a lot of people actually knowing the songs while we're in front of them playing. We're really curious about that reaction."

But if one thing assuages those "fears," it's that the band are in this for the long run, including plans for a "five-song EP of older songs that we never finished," according to Catherine Cooper. Just don't call this yet another reunion.

"I'd want people not to think of it as a reunion because we certainly don't see it that way," she says. "We see it as coming back together to play some shows and hopefully keep playing like nothing ever happened in between. When I hear reunion, it smacks of, 'We're just going to squeeze what we can out of this record and be done with it.'"

Because this isn't about luck, social media stats or musical trends. Bands form and later fade away just as likely as they are to remain eternal. Other times you've just got to wait for that perfect opportunity.

"We're just happy that it's reached a new audience, and if we can continue to make more of this music for people, that's what we'd like to do," Catherine Cooper says. "We're super grateful, but it's about time."

Alison's Halo. 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 7. Valley Bar, 130 N. Central Ave. Tickets are $20. Visit valleybarphx.com.