With short dreads, multiple face piercings and a lean and well-inked torso, Novulent—who in photos often looks downward, unsmiling—presents as a classic example of the ever-brooding artist.
And in keeping with that visage, Novulent, who uses the pronouns they/them, makes music that comes at you from a distance. Slabs of heavily echoed guitar move through slow-moving chords at sludgy tempos; the vocals are distorted, pushed back in the mix, spectral. The melodies are glacial, vague, the lyrics all but indistinguishable.
It’s OK to call it shoegaze. Novulent does. The artist stirs in elements of nu-metal, dream-pop and slo-core for music that closes in and washes over you.
Novulent, 21, has been extremely busy since dropping a DIY tune, “M.I.A.,” in 2022. They’ve independently released dozens of short songs — stand-alone singles, EPs and four full-lengths. Streams piled up to the extent that Capitol Records signed Novulent a year ago. A new album is set for release on the label. Three advance singles, now available on streaming services, are more fully realized than the earlier work. They showcase upgraded sonic architectures, with crisp drums and guitars that build to delicious crescendos. On “rip,” in particular, Novulent’s vocals are more forward in the mix, albeit still laden with echo.
For their headlining tour, which kicks off in Miami on Sept. 30, Novulent (pronounced No-vulent) has been fleshed out to a band that includes a drummer, bassist and guitarist. They play Crowbar on Wednesday, Oct. 1.
Novulent w/ Zeruel
Time Wed., Oct. 1, 7 p.m. 2025
Location Crowbar, 1812 North 17th Street, Tampa
I requested an interview with the enigmatic artist based solely on how the music grabbed me — or, perhaps better said, bathed me. I could find precious little information about Novulent online, other than they’re from Texas and started making DIY music at age 17. I was curious about Novulent’s background—they seemed an atypical shoegaze act—but was prepared for evasive answers from a purposefully mysterious musician.
As it turned out, no one had asked. So I did. During an hour-long phone interview, Novulent was good-natured, voluble, eager to answer at length any query I posed. (Unfortunately, my recording came up blank. I took notes, but not carefully enough to quote the artist at length.)
Novulent, who preferred to keep his birth name confidential, was conceived in Zimbabwe by parents who were natives of that African country, then born in Dallas. Because they were new immigrants, the artist explained, the family moved around to various places in the Dallas area. Novulent’s father was a deeply religious man who did not allow rock music in the home. At about nine-years-old, Novulent was watching an anime movie on TV when the theme song made the youngster sit bolt upright. It was the Deftone’s “Change (In the House of Flies.)” Novulent instantly became an alt-metal fanatic, albeit a closeted one.
Novulent said his father gradually loosened up on his rock prohibition but died suddenly of an illness when the future Novulent was 13. Another key moment in the artist’s development occurred when they heard the 2019 album Feels Like You by the shoegaze band Whirr.
Novulent fiddled with making music in their mid-teens. The budding artist played violin as a youngster but was effectively starting from scratch while living under their mother’s roof. They wanted to call themselves Nova, but the name was taken. So they played with various syllables and rather randomly came up with Novulent.
They worked a 6 a.m. to early afternoon shift at a gas station, and then hustled home to create music. Novulent recorded songs into an iPhone 6 using the free BandLab app and a busted-up pair of Apple headphones. Early efforts were slow love songs built around simple synth patterns and acoustic guitar, with vocals tuned down a few octaves. The music was more akin to R&B slow jams than shoegaze. Some of them bordered on uptempo. The 2022 single “Like Its Summer” (stylized all lowercase) is damn near sunny. No matter how amateurish, no matter how nascent, Novulent posted the songs.
A turning point came in 2023 when Novulent built a wall of electric guitars around “Blinded.” A musical identity emerged, one rooted in shoegaze. Novulent continued to push songs into the ether—“to basically nobody,” he said—until the track “Savior” gained some streaming traction. Then, still using the lo-fi recording set-up, Novulent worked with L.A.-based producer Vurk to combine thick, grimey guitar with their vocals and in four days finished the song “scars,” a minute-and-a-half of shoegaze bliss.
Not long after, and unbeknownst to Novulent, “scars” turned up as background music on a post by Megan Thee Stallion showcasing images from her trip to Japan. “It blew up,” Novulent effused, a touch of awe still resonating in their voice. “I DM’d her but didn’t hear back. She has millions of followers. I would love to meet her someday and tell her how grateful I was, how much of an impact she had on my career.”
Armed with a superstar’s imprimatur, and a suddenly booming listenership (“scars” has notched more than 162 million plays on Spotify alone) Novulent’s career has taken off—albeit within a cult cocoon. The artist first performed live with backing tracks, but it soon became apparent that such an approach wouldn’t cut it. Novulent recruited three members of the Baltimore outfit The Missing Peace to form a backing band. The upcoming tour encompasses 13 cities.
Novulent the artist fronts the quartet, occasionally playing rudimentary power chords on guitar. But the artist’s stage charisma really shines through when wielding just a microphone. It’s during these animated sequences that Novulent performs with a physical verve far removed from standing still and gazing at shoes.
I asked Novulent what they hate most and love most about touring. Hate: traveling (with their equipment crammed into a van) and shelling out money for expenses. Love: “Interacting with my fans. Seeing them out in the audience. Performing for them, meeting them. That, to me, is far more satisfying than keeping track of the number of streams I have.”
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