REVIEW: Chanel Beads Turns Vulnerability Into Brilliance on “The Coward Forgets His Nightmare”
WRITTEN BY LAUREN CHENETTE
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Photo by Bella McDonald
Chanel Beads is having a big moment. As the lights come up at Madison Square Garden, the New York musician, known offstage as Shane Lavers, opens for Lorde in front of a sold-out crowd just hours after releasing his stunning new single “The Coward Forgets His Nightmare." The track captures everything that makes Chanel Beads one of the most intriguing voices in music right now, including emotional honesty, cinematic scope, and an ability to turn vulnerability into something transcendent.
Built around Zachary Paul’s sweeping violin and Maya McGrory’s delicate harmonies, the song moves like a dream you don’t want to wake up from. Lavers layers his vocals through glistening textures and ghostly ambience, creating a sound that feels suspended in time. It’s equal parts intimate and otherworldly, a reminder of how Chanel Beads can make something deeply personal feel universal.
Where the 2024 debut album Your Day Will Come explored the blurry intersections of post-punk, pop, and electronic music, “The Coward Forgets His Nightmare” finds clarity within that chaos. There’s a sense of healing beneath the haze, a brightness peeking through the melancholia. Each sound feels deliberate yet instinctive, stitched together with the same care that defines Lavers’ world-building approach to songwriting.
The track made its live debut at a surprise set at NYC’s Intercom, and marks the start of a major new chapter. Chanel Beads joins Lorde for a run of sold-out shows before linking up with Grizzly Bear for two nights at Brooklyn Steel. He’ll then close out this stretch of performances with a headline show at The Ground in Miami and at Mexico City’s Corona Capital Festival. It’s a whirlwind few weeks for Lavers, but the energy around Chanel Beads feels perfectly timed. With “The Coward Forgets His Nightmare," he’s carved out a space where introspection and connection meet, where anxiety can shimmer into beauty, and quiet moments can feel enormous.
If Your Day Will Come was a promise, “The Coward Forgets His Nightmare” feels like the moment it starts coming true, in a clear, confident step towards the light.