‘Stephen Bluhm really brings it for me, makes a true believer out of
me concerning music and artistic expression.’
- Mike Watt (Minutemen, fIREHOSE, Stooges)

Work Crush is the new synth pop group led by Stephen Bluhm, joined at live dates by Scott Kellerhouse on bass (Aphasia Minor, Hellish Cashstrap) and Ethan Kelly on keys.

Mike Watt, punk pioneer as co-founder of Minutemen, joins on the first Work Crush single, Emotional Plea, out digitally August 28 on Vintage Annals Archive. Set to a driving disco beat, Emotional Plea cuts deep to the desperation so many people are feeling in the face of a heartless and violent administration, asking “what is our dark destiny allowing this to be?” Watt elevates the track with his signature melodic bass, and Alex Wernquest (Camp Saint Helene) provides the rhythm, which was recorded along with Bluhm’s vocal at Wernquest’s Catskill, NY studio Basement Floods. Bluhm sings passionately, and adds classic synth sounds and a Nile Rodgersish chucking guitar. Work Crush refuses to use generative AI, and Bluhm asked musician and illustrator Steve Teare (Flat Mary Road) to create the evocative artwork, a child playing with a toy military plane.

New York’s Hudson Valley is a hotbed of artistic creativity, and Bluhm has been at the center of it all for the past decade, building a loyal following attuned to his uniquely crafted synth and orchestral pop.

‘I have much respect for Out of the Nowhere Into the Here. Your honest, from-the-heart subject matter gives rise to elegant lyrics and gorgeous melodies. Brave, courageous, and bold! Great arrangements too!’ - Jonathan Richman

Prior to forming Work Crush, for Bluhm’s recent full-length, Out of the Nowhere Into the Here, he arranged a dozen orchestral musicians to join his piano and vocal on a whimsical but courageously intimate chamber pop masterwork. The gently charming but powerful collection earned high praise from members of The Magnetic Fields, and several artists famously associated with 70s punk: Mike Watt, Jonathan Richman, and Wreckless Eric. It was dubbed “profound and beautiful” by American Highways and called a “baroque pop masterpiece” by Stereo Embers, while Post-Punk said “you’d have to have a heart of stone to not be affected by this sublime collection.”

Watt and Bluhm hit it off when Bluhm was a guest on The Watt From Pedro show talking about Out of the Nowhere Into the Here. Watt soon took Bluhm around the San Pedro neighborhood of Los Angeles, passing down history lessons from the early punk Minutemen days. When Bluhm was preparing the first Work Crush single it was clear Watt would be the perfect addition. Watt agreed and sent his bass recording from Pedro within 24 hours.

After a dozen year stint in the tech industry at Etsy’s Hudson Valley office, Bluhm found himself laid off with 11% of the company. Deciding he’d had enough of the corporate office scene, he adopted a new career tuning and repairing pianos around the Hudson Vally and Western Massachusetts, surrounding himself in music and the local community even more.

While Bluhm has been “making songs ever since I can remember,” in his teenage years it was his older siblings’ Lou Reed and David Bowie records that ignited his adolescent musical obsession. While attending Temple University, he took the plunge into live music via campus open-mic nights and from there burst upon the bustling Philadelphia scene, prompting the Philadelphia City Paper to dub him “an old soul, writing Tin Pan Alley-ish fare and singing croon-y folk jazz in a voice that’d make Morrisey swoon.” In the Hudson Valley, he further honed his expressive performing style: Belying the serious slants of some of his songs, Bluhm’s shows often find him dancing madly among delighted audience members.