Paige Barlow and Miles Dupire-Gagnon Talk For Dolly, Their Debut Album Due in 2026

Transmission 369: Interview with Hush

Hush are a Montreal trio , Paige Barlow, Miles Dupire-Gagnon, and Gabriel Lambert , whose debut single The Mirrors Were Right arrives via Simone Records ahead of a full-length due in 2026. Barlow handles lead vocals; Dupire-Gagnon and Lambert play across a shared pool of instruments that draws on analog synthesis, piano, and live recording techniques processed through tape and speed manipulation, co-produced with René Wilson and mixed by Miles Dupire-Gagnon and René Wilson.

Title: For Dolly
Artist: Hush
Release Date: 2026-05-26
Genres: Dream Pop, Krautrock, Psychedelic Rock, Surf Rock
Label: Simone Records
Description: Hush interview: Montreal trio Paige Barlow, Miles Dupire-Gagnon, Gabriel Lambert on debut single The Mirrors Were Right, Simone Records.

The band sits within a Montreal scene dense with working musicians, though their particular corner of it pulls from jazz, krautrock, surf, and dream-pop — Barlow grew up between Atlanta and a French-language practice that shaped her lyrical approach; Dupire-Gagnon came up on Coltrane and Miles Davis before the full sweep of his mother’s record collection widened the frame. The Mirrors Were Right takes dissociation and perceptual instability as its subject, the lyrics tracing moments of sudden clarity against longer periods of disconnection. The accompanying video was directed with Abid Youssef. The album title, For Dolly, is a dedication to Barlow’s cat, who died during the recording process.

Featured image: © Aabid Youssef

Which artists or records first shaped your interest in music? What motivated you to start playing and learning an instrument?

Paige Barlow: I’m not really sure there’s any one particular artist that brought me into music. It feels like it was something that was just always an interest of mine. Growing up, I really liked the Pixies, Patti Smith, My Bloody Valentine, lots of bands. But it always felt like it was a thing I was going to do, so I just followed the instincts.

Miles Dupire-Gagnon: I was born with a mother that listened to all kinds of music. My mom would always listen to all kinds of stuff, but I would say I was pretty much brought up with jazz; a lot of Coltrane, Miles Davis. My name is Miles, actually, because my parents were Miles Davis fans. A lot of black music from the 60s and 70s, but also everything. She would put on a Coltrane record and then put on a Metallica record. All kinds of music, like Paige, I’d say.

How did the three of you decide to start a project together? What felt different about this collaboration compared to your previous work?

Miles: Me and Gab had a few bands together, so already just having Paige aboard was a bit different. She has a kind of super trippy voice. We started working on our music not really knowing exactly what we wanted. For me, I wanted it to have some real songwriting — not just a vibe, but songs that would make sense being played on a piano and a guitar or whatever. Just some songwriting and fancy chords. That’s what we were trying to do.

Paige: It all stemmed from some demos that Miles had. We just ended up exploring multiple different avenues and finding that what we were doing was sounding really good. I was really excited because all the projects I’d had in the recent past were ones where I was singing and writing in French, which is my second language. So I was excited to do something in my first language and feel that out and see where that would take me mentally.

Does Montreal influence the music you make?

Miles: There are so many amazing bands here, so I think talent always influences you. It’s not something you consciously think about — you hear stuff, you go see shows. It’s a community here, a lot of musicians. When you have so many talented people around you, it just makes it into something.

Paige: It’s sneaky how it does it to you. A lot of our friends are musicians or artists of other mediums living in Montreal, so I’m really grateful to always be surrounded by talented people and by what they put out. It’s inspiring, definitely motivating. When it comes to collaborations, super fun. It feeds the soul a lot.

Paige, how did moving from Atlanta to Montreal change you as an artist?

Paige: In so many ways. It’s been seven years now. When I moved to Montreal I was making music, but not in any real way — at that point I was more focused on my visual art. When I moved here, I was really inspired by just how many people were pursuing music as their full-time career and just giving it their all. It kind of allowed me to put my hands up and say, okay, I can do this too. The singing in French opened up a lot — it was a key to so many different writing techniques. When you’re first learning a language, you kind of have to create meaning where there isn’t yet. It’s a kind of creative cat-and-mouse thing before you’re fully fluent, and it gave me a lot of opportunities to chase subjects or prompt myself with ideas that I probably wouldn’t have otherwise.

Is there a common thread running through all the songs of the album, or is it a collection of different episodes?

Paige: I’d say it’s both. When I go into projects, I have one purpose in mind, but the real thread doesn’t reveal itself until it’s over. It’s like a time capsule — the things you experience are the things you were thinking about. Musically, it’s definitely exploratory.

Miles: Musically, there’s a common vibe to it. We wanted it to be a bit conceptual — to have a side A, side B. It’s kind of a trance, something you listen to almost like two songs: one vinyl side to the other.

The Mirrors Were Right deals with perception, dissociation, the gap between feeling and reality. Is the album about consciousness, or does it go somewhere else entirely?

Paige: It does touch on consciousness. It kind of acts in an archaeological way in my mind — brushing through different feelings and different experiences and how that contests against the notions I have at the forefront of my mind on an everyday basis. There’s definitely a self-searching aspect to it, lyrically for sure.

What non-musical art forms — writers, artists, poets — feed into what you do?

Paige: Kind of all of the above. My favorite notion to live by is the art of noticing — just the art of being fully present, looking around you and seeing the art that exists in daily life. Visual art, definitely. Photography. I’m a bookworm too. I couldn’t name specifically any authors or artists that influenced this particular piece — it was kind of monumental in my mind. It was everything I had known up until this point; I put all my energy and all my thoughts into it.

Miles: Same thing.

The video was conceived by Paige and Abid Youssef. How closely do the visuals need to mirror the music for you, and where do you want them to diverge?

Paige: Visuals are really important to me because I often start a project or an idea based on a kind of visual or vision I have in my mind — I see things visually sometimes before I do sonically. It was a real pleasure to work with Abid because he understood what I wanted to show and what I wanted to keep hidden. It was really fluid with him, and he’s very talented.

What’s the one instrument or piece of gear that defines the sound of this record?

Miles: It’s pretty synth-y, I guess, because the demos were all composed with a bunch of synths. We have a lot of analog, old-school synths. Hopefully it sounds kind of lushy — there’s a lot of different tones. It’s very busy, but the tones make it work. We put a lot of heart into how it sounded. But it was truly composed on piano at first.

Paige: Studio techniques played a role too. We recorded live and then had overdubs in many different situations, with various speed techniques and other stuff.

Miles: A lot of analog-meets-digital. We used tape and old-school techniques, but we also played some songs live and some weren’t. It’s a big mash-up.

Any hint about the album title?

Paige: For Dolly — Dolly was my soul cat, rest in peace. She was quietly there during the whole recording process. I wanted to dedicate the album to her because a lot of the subjects and themes dance around liminal space and phasing between one state of mind and another. I thought it was appropriate.

Miles: The picture is cool too. We just thought it was a good idea. It freaked us out when she died.

Photos courtesy of © Hush

Matteo Damiani

Matteo Damiani is an Italian photographer and author. Curator of the sites Retrofuturista.com; weirditaly.com; china-underground.com and others