Sima Cunningham is a Chicago-based singer, songwriter, musician, presenter, and one of the founding members of the art-rock band, Finom. Her long-awaited solo LP-- High Roller -- was released on Ruination Records in August 2023. These videos are from her amazing record release show at Constellation in Chicago, recorded on December 13, 2024. Max Subar opened the show with a killer set and also joined Sima later in her show. If you have a chance to see Sima or Macie solo or together as Finom I highly recommend it, they are tremendous talents!
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Band Members:
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Sima Cunningham: Vocals, Guitar and Piano (@simaamis)
Liam Kazar: Guitar and Piano (@liamkazar)
Dorian Gehring: Guitar and Pedal Steel (@dorfg)
Spencer Tweedy: Drums (@spencertweedy
Kelly Hannermann: Bass (@auntkellymusic)
Macie Stewart: Violin (@maciestewart)
Karyln Gehring: Violin (@karl_yn)
Elizabeth Moen: Vocals (@elizabethmoenmusic)
Max Subar: Guitar and Vocals (@max.subar)
Websites:
Sima Cunningham: www.simacunningham.com/
Finom: www.finommusic.com/
Bandcamp: simacunningham.bandcamp.com
Record label: Runation Records (@ruinationrecordco)
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From the album bio:
Sima is a soothsayer. Sima is a friend-soother. Sima is a bearer of memories. And Sima is the hub of a bicycle wheel with spokes that span the whole City of Chicago.
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In High Roller, her first full-length out on Ruination Records since 2014, Sima brings all of these roles to bear. She floats into the minds of friends who have survived violence, a family member who was never able to speak, a classmate who was lost to bigotry, and builds a floor underneath them, a platform as comforting as a traditional Armenian quilt, as thrilling and delightful as a Tin Pan Alley tune. As she offers support to these loved ones in the form of songs, you feel her prescience and her empathy. You feel as though her clear, fair eyes are gazing not just at an unknown other but at you, too.
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Together with multi-instrumentalist Dorian Gehring, brother Liam Kazar on bass, and a cast of Chicago-based musicians including Macie Stewart, Spencer Tweedy, Elizabeth Moen, Andrew Sa, Charles Rumback, Jack Henry and Twin Peaks’ Clay Frankel, Sima grows a garden of an album that progresses from wild-growing prairie grass-her folk roots-to diligent, gorgeous topiaries. Opener “Nothing” explodes into a prog-adjacent swirl. Undulating guitars amplified by a Leslie organ speaker couch “For Liam.” And passing-traffic violins lilt the title track to a dejected yet somehow defiant end.
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High Roller rises to an emotional peak in its final track, a shining moment in which a simple slice of vegan cheese is illuminated by the sum of all light in the universe, with the cosmic rays of a grieving friend’s impossible pain. “Adonai” is about Sima’s friend who died by suicide in high school, at a time when he couldn’t imagine anyone accepting him for who he was. Sima sings “to put it out into the universe that you are missed so much … I really miss your touch.” And some of these scattered rays bounce back from the cosmos onto us.
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Apart from all its sensitivity, support, and sacrifice, High Roller is also a warning, a humane kick in the pants of self-concerned people who dare to ignore the wise and the careful among us-who dare to ignore Sima in particular. “I could be the golden one If someone had the common sense to hear me out,” she laments without any self-pity, only hard-earned knowing. May we all have the common sense to hear Sima out.
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