Drive by Odd Beholder
Odd Beholder, the electro wave / indie pop project of Swiss musician Daniela Weinmann, will release the new single “Drive” on November 7, 2025, announcing the release of the fourth album “Honest Work” in spring 2026.
On this straightforward shoegaze track, we encounter someone on the run — though what exactly they’re running from remains unclear. With each subsequent track, and with the album itself, the picture will eventually come into focus.
“Drive” tells the end of its story right at the beginning: “Get going, get out of here!” Someone has to step on the gas, leave in a rush with a half-packed backpack: Out of the spiral, straight toward the horizon. The song celebrates a fleeting sense of empowerment — something must be reclaimed here and now, even if only for a moment, even if it’s just the feeling of being able to act. A road trip as an urgent intervention.
Although little is revealed about the escape itself, the song’s ending already gives some clues: “They take and they take and they’re selling it back to us now that we’re needy. Are you gonna eat those? I need another dose.”
“Drive” also means impulse, motivation. The first single from “Honest Work” suggests that honest work might have something to do with the workers’ own drive. Daniela Weinmann says:
“On social media, ADHD self-diagnoses are piling up, and many people seem to suffer from a lack of motivation. But maybe it’s less about the people themselves, and more about a zeitgeist that demands constant motivation while offering little long-term, meaningful incentives. The easy solution seems to be grabbing stimulants, with or without therapy. Workaholism and addiction as a widespread life condition in a consumer society, where the prospect of an overpriced daily matcha latte has to console us for the fact that owning a home will remain unaffordable and the future is becoming poisoned with plastic, stripped of species, and overheated. How honest does work feel when you see no meaning in it?”
The cover artwork shows a USB drive on a highway bridge — a scene some Swiss music lovers may find familiar. The dead drop, which was actually chained to a highway bridge in Düdingen (near Bern, CH) as street art, already contains the single as an MP3, even before it appears on the usual streaming services. With this, Weinmann drops another hint about the stories she will weave together on the coming album, and with the choice of cover for “Drive”, she asks what music distribution looks like in times of “Broligarchy.”
