What Writing Fear as Water Towers & Submarines Says About Sol Est
What Writing Fear as Water Towers & Submarines Says About Sol Est
A Debut Single From Baltimore That Turns Two Irrational Fears Into Soft, Surf-Tinged Dream Pop
The cover of Water Towers & Submarines puts Sol Est on a rock above a lake, seen from behind. A rope swing hangs over the water. That image of height, depth and a long drop sets up the debut single, released on 16 August 2024. It is a dream pop song about two fears that the lyric keeps calling irrational.
Sol Est’s Water Towers & Submarines now sits in our Dream Pop, Chamber Pop, Ethereal Pop playlist below, with the full story so far on Sol Est’s artist profile. The single reached this desk through PopHits.Co Music Charts, which verifies independent artists and places their releases across its network of music news titles. Listen first, then keep reading to see how it is built.
The styling is soft, sun-faded and handwritten. The song inside it is built the same way, and it rewards a close listen to how it is put together.
A Big Blue Tower in the Sky and a Metal Tank Below, the Two Images Holding the Song Together
The lyric works in two directions. Up top there is the big blue water tower, watched as it fades in a rear-view mirror. Down below there is a metal tank under pressure on every side, which, the song insists, can never sink. In between, the words keep asking why something known to be irrational is still so bothersome.
That is the whole idea, and the arrangement follows it. Sol Est wrote and arranged the song. The release leans on lush synthesizer layers with a delicate, close vocal over the top. The effect is a song that sounds calm while describing a mind that is not.
On Bandcamp the single carries the artist’s own tags, and they say a lot about the direction. They read surf pop, chill indie, alternative pop, electronic music and alternative EDM. Most of all, the niche is dream pop. Put together, they describe exactly the blend the track goes for, with a beach-day haze over electronic bones.
The structure gives the images time. At four minutes and 17 seconds, Water Towers & Submarines runs longer than most debut singles. The length lets each picture settle before the next one arrives, and nothing is rushed towards a hook.
Produced by Justin Levy, Water Towers & Submarines Is a Four-Minute Debut With Room to Breathe
The credits are short. According to the Bandcamp page, Justin Levy produced the track and Mat Leffler-Schulman mastered it. Sol Est shares the production work. It is a small team for a first release, and it shows in how uncluttered the record is.
That restraint matters in dream pop, where the temptation is to bury everything in reverb. A song resting on two concrete pictures only works if the words come through. A lean release like this one gives them the space to do it.
The Baltimore tag on the release is worth noticing too. The city’s best-known dream pop export is Beach House. Its records stack slow organ and synth lines under Victoria Legrand’s vocal until the whole thing glows. For a gentler, groove-led reference, Men I Trust keep their vocals soft and close over clean, unhurried arrangements. Water Towers & Submarines borrows a little from both. It has the layered synth patience of the first and the close, unshowy vocal of the second.
So who is it for? Listeners who like dream pop with a clear subject rather than pure atmosphere. It suits anyone who has felt a fear they know makes no sense. It also suits a late summer drive past a water tower.
From the AltPop.News curator team: “The smartest choice on Water Towers & Submarines is the length. Four minutes and 17 seconds lets the tower and the tank arrive one at a time. Meanwhile, the calm arrangement plays against an anxious lyric instead of matching it.”
From Water Towers & Submarines to Prettyboy, Where to Hear Sol Est Two Years On
Water Towers & Submarines was the first Sol Est release, and the catalogue has grown steadily since. Sunsick followed on 30 May 2025, then Better Days on 5 September 2025, Snow on 16 January 2026 and Prettyboy on 17 July 2026.
Live, the songs have reached a stage too. The project’s YouTube channel carries a full set from a songwriter showcase. It is a useful way to hear how the material sits without the studio layers. Sol Est has also spoken to Voyage Maryland, the regional magazine that profiles Maryland artists and creatives, in its Conversations series.
Stream the single on Spotify, and hear the newest release, Prettyboy, on Spotify. Follow Sol Est on Spotify, Apple Music, SoundCloud and Bandcamp.
For the socials, Sol Est posts on Instagram and TikTok, and every link sits on the Linktree.
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