Aly and AJ are sitting back and allowing the universe to take the reigns!
Nearly two decades removed from their days as Disney darlings, sister duo Alyson and AJ Michalka continue to pursue music, letting lyrical inspiration and their sound be influenced by life’s circumstances.
Aly and AJ have spent the last five and a half years recording and releasing 80s-inspired and synth-laden pop, and they’re only going forward! The duo kicked off a string of records full of pop goodness with 2017’s “Ten Years,” and acknowledged a period of peak creativity with the title of the 2020 compilation “We Don’t Stop.”
The thought of hanging it up is far from Aly and AJ’s minds; the “Potential Breakup Song” singers are gearing up to release a new album “With Love From” next week and are embarking on a tour in support of the road trip-inspired album.
Aly And AJ Have Been Hard At Work Allowing Listeners To Get To Know Them As Adults
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Aly and AJ rose to fame in the mid-aughts. Aly starred on the Disney Channel millennial favorite, “Phil Of The Future,” and the music video for Aly and AJ’s cover of “Do You Believe In Magic” became a staple in the channel’s rotation.
Two years later, the duo released “Insomniac,” which contained the hit song “Potential Breakup Song.” The 2007 single would resonate with Aly and AJ’s fanbase to the point where the duo released a ‘mature’ explicit version of “Potential Breakup Song” in 2020!
The duo never stopped dancing in the following year, “a touch of the beat gets you up on your feet gets you out and into the sun.”
‘With Love From’ Is A Gift And Travel Companion To Their Fans
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Aly and AJ aren’t quite out of their sunny era full of positive vibes just yet; the duo spoke to Numero magazine ahead of “With Love From,” and dished on the record’s influences, which includes continuing on a similar path as their latest album. Their fans also play a large role in the record’s trajectory, acting as a major source of inspiration.
As Aly tells Numero, “We wanted to make a record that felt like we were making a love letter to our fans across the US and around the world as well. And for whatever reason, these songs feel like songs that you would be listening to on a long cross-country road trip…”
She goes on to add that the idea was featured a bit on their previous record, and the duo wanted to continue exploring the concept on “With Love From.”
“But with this record, we dove deeper into that concept, also just stripping back anything that seemed electronic or modern in its instrumentation. We kind of wanted to go back to our roots a bit in terms of the instrumentation we did choose to use. It was important to us that it would reflect well in our live show and I think we’ve gotten our knowledge because of doing so much touring over the past few years,” Aly says.
AJ acknowledged a coincidental element that continuously appeared in the duo’s subconscious as they were laying the groundwork for the new LP, which will be released on March 15th.
“It’s interesting because when we were creating the record and also working on the art for the record,” AJ tells the outlet, “traveling to take spills and shoot music video clips and figure out promotional material, this storm kept following us, and we were like, ‘This is bizarre.’ When we were writing this record, we had weather in mind a lot. I think also this year is going to be an insane year for weather,” she continues. “So I think our record being up and down telling of how the weather can shift and change really fast is actually really telling to what this year is going to look like. For us, our lives are really frenetic, there’s always changing. We will be on the road one day and filming a movie the next. It’s a really insane industry that we’re in and I think because we’ve split ourselves between acting and music, it can be really frenetic.”
The ‘With Love From’ Tour Kicks Off At The End Of The Month
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Aly and AJ’s tour in support of their new album will begin on Thursday, March 23rd in Oakland, California. They will be on the road until September; the tour concludes on September 8th in Los Angeles!
Longtime fans will be in for a treat! The duo is going to perform some reimagined versions of their classic tunes.
Aly says, “We’re also bringing back some really old songs from our past that we’re kind of trying to flip on their head and rethink their layout in our set.” (via Numero)
