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JULIEN BAKER’S RECORD STORE DAY EXCLUSIVE 7” NOW AVAILABLE ON STREAMING SERVICES
On the heels of her triumphant Matador Records debut Turn Out the Lights and the critically acclaimed EP as one-third of boygenius (not to mention recent team-ups with Matt Berninger, The National, and Jack Antonoff), Julien Baker returns with her first new solo recordings in almost two years, previously only available as a Record Store Day Exclusive 7”. The Red Door/Conversation Piece 7 debuted at #6 on the Record Store Day Exclusive Singles chart, and both songs are now available on all streaming services.
A fan-favourite during live shows, “Red Door” is a lush and atmospheric track driven by Baker’s complex fingerpicking and a hint of slide guitar, her voice soaring as she pleads “set me on fire in the middle of the street / bend my knees, paint the concrete / the colour of my bloody knuckles / pulling splinters form the chapel door.” A previously unreleased cut begun during the Turn Out the Lights sessions, “Conversation Piece” is a meditation on loneliness, backed by delicate percussion and chiming guitars.
Baker’s signature blend of uplifting, intricate melodies and wistful words are represented superbly by this 7” pairing, and fans can look forward to hearing the new songs on her upcoming run of live shows, including her performance at the Sled island Music Festival on June 22nd
CAR SEAT HEADREST TO RELEASE COMMIT YOURSELF COMPLETELY, NEW LIVE ALBUM OUT JUNE 17TH ON MATADOR RECORDS
Car Seat Headrest today announces Commit Yourself Completely – a new nine-track live album that will be released June 17th on Matador Records.
Culled from performances across the UK, US and France, the nine-track album spans material from 2014’s breakout Teens Of Denial and 2018’s reimagined epic Twin Fantasy – as well as the first officially released recording of longtime live staple ‘Ivy’ by Frank Ocean.
A filmed version of the performance of ‘Fill In The Blank’ which appears on the album, recorded in Columbus, Ohio, can be seen now HERE.
“This is a compilation of songs from shows we played in 2018,” says Will Toledo. “We recorded every show we did that year, and I went through about 50 of them to get the final tracklist for this album. This isn’t necessarily the best possible version of each track, but it’s some of the most fun we’ve had on stage. I particularly remember the show we did in the small French town of Amiens, maybe the smallest show we did that year, and how great it felt to be up in people’s faces with everyone plugging in to the music right away. The recordings we made of the shows came out very clean, so rather than try to artificially recreate how it sounded in the different venues night to night, I tried to give the whole album that in-your-face feeling, like we’re playing the songs right in front of you. When you’re onstage with everything happening at once, you never really know what it sounds like in the room anyways; all you know is how the music is feeling. Hopefully this will give you a sense of what these shows felt like.”
A snapshot of the 7-person lineup featuring members of Naked Giants experienced by crowds worldwide over the last two years, Commit Yourself Completely offers a visceral, loose and ebullient take on these much-loved songs, as well as an an incandescent capstone of a formative touring period as Car Seat Headrest readies his next studio album. Musicians featured on the album are Will Toledo (vocals), Seth Dalby (bass), Ethan Ives (guitar, vocals), Andrew Katz (drums, vocals), Grant Mullen (guitar, vocals) Gianni Aiello (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Henry LaVallee (additional percussion).
For their final shows as a 7-piece, Car Seat Headrest play a North American headline tour later this month, which includes a performance at the Winnipeg Folk Festival.
EFTERKLANG Announce New Album Altid Sammen
Seven years after their last album release, Efterklang make a welcome return with a fifth studio record Altid Sammen on 20 September.
Altid Sammen album opener ‘Vi er uendelig’ (“We are infinite”) is released today digitally. The accompanying visuals, directed by Andreas Koefoed (behind the band’s film The Ghost Of Piramida), and featuring a fellow Dane, the model and photographer Helena Christensen, are a homage to an iconic Johnny Hallyday TV performance in 1964.
Altid Sammen (meaning “always together”) is deep and sonorous, steeped in the sonic experimentation that has long been their trademark since Tripper, the Danes’ 2004 debut. As bold and ambitious in scope as their last collection of songs, Piramida, Casper Clausen (vocals), Mads Brauer (synths, electronics) and Rasmus Stolberg (bass) have taken another creative U-turn, this time fusing baroque instrumentation with their signature expansive sound.
Efterklang’s last release, Piramida, centred around a ghost town in the Arctic, was a grand and all-encompassing project that spawned a movie, live album and a series of unforgettable shows (including a live debut at the Sydney Opera House). Their final performance in Sønderborg – the southern Danish town where the band grew up – marked a closing of a chapter, for Piramida and for Efterklang.
“We needed a break from the album and touring routine, and we needed a break from Efterklang,” says Clausen. “After the Sønderborg show, things felt very exciting – and a bit scary too. We could think freely, and move in new directions again, just focusing on the things that excited the 3 of us.”
That break saw the trio explore projects outside of the group’s confines. Together they co-wrote and performed an opera with friend and composer Karsten Fundal (LEAVES, The Colour Of Falling) as part of the Copenhagen Opera Festival. Meanwhile, Clausen, Brauer and Stolberg reunited with Efterklang’s touring drummer Tatu Rönkkö for a new band, Liima. In sharp contrast to Efterklang, they scaled down the music process, creating songs in a day, and released two records of icy, grand electronic pop, ii (2016) and 1982 (2017).
What lured them back as Efterklang was another off-kilter collaboration, this time with B.O.X, a Belgian ensemble founded by lute player Pieter Theuns that performs new music with baroque orchestration. Initially invited by Theuns to compose music for a joint performance, the experience inspired and invigorated the trio to return to the studio for a new Efterklang album proper. For perhaps the first time in the band’s history, they took a less-is-more approach to Altid Sammen, engaging on a more primal and emotional level. The album also sees the trio break from tradition with Clausen singing in his mother tongue some of his most personal lyrics thus far.
“Altid Sammen’s songs are about belief and togetherness,” Clausen says. “Not in a religious way – none of us are believers of a defined religion. The words are searching for meaning in intimate relationships, in nature, in death and eternity. The bonds we create; to gather, hold hands, sing or share a moment together. We’re all connected, across nations, age, sex and gender. We come together with all of our backgrounds, and we move apart in all sorts of directions, always together.”
MINIDISCS [HACKED] RADIOHEAD MAKE 18 HOURS OF STOLEN OK COMPUTER SESSIONS AVAILABLE ON BANDCAMP
In response to last week’s leak of 18 minidisc files, Radiohead have decided to make the sessions available in their entirety on Bandcamp.
The 18 minidiscs – MINIDISCS [HACKED] – will be available for £18
Jonny Greenwood says:
“We got hacked last week – someone stole Thom’s minidisk archive from around the time of OK Computer, and reportedly demanded $150,000 on threat of releasing it.
So instead of complaining – much – or ignoring it, we’re releasing all 18 hours on Bandcamp in aid of Extinction Rebellion.
Just for the next 18 days. So for £18 you can find out if we should have paid that ransom.
Never intended for public consumption (though some clips did reach the cassette in the OK Computer reissue) it’s only tangentially interesting. And very, very long. Not a phone download. Rainy out, isn’t it though?
Jonny”
All proceeds will go to Extinction Rebellion, the socio-political movement which uses nonviolent resistance to protest against climate breakdown, biodiversity loss, and the risk of human extinction and ecological collapse.
Girl Band announce new album “The Talkies”
Girl Band are happy to announce their new album The Talkies releasing through Rough Trade Records on September 27th, 2019.
The album was produced by the band’s own Daniel Fox and will be available on Vinyl / CD / Stream.
This is the follow up to their debut album “Holding Hands with Jamie” that came out four years ago almost to the day.
“The Talkies” was recorded in November 2018 at Ballintubbert House, a stately home on the outskirts of Dublin “a few pay grades above what we’re used to”. The alien construction of Ballintubbert and its corridors help to navigate Girl Bands cataclysmic sound within a world of its own.
Bandmember Alan Duggan underlines this thought: “In many ways the idea behind the album was to make an audio representation of the house” -Daniel continues – “We recorded all the drums twice: once on the landing and once in the cellar, and during production we could actually cut in between both these sounds.”
Daniel with his feet in both camps as musician and producer explains: “After we cancelled the last tour we weren’t really writing together as much anymore so we were more into demoing and writing down parts then cutting them up, collaging them together in the computer and reconfiguring them that way”.
The first track to be released from the album is Shoulderblades.
Sonically, the landscape vacillates from a dissonant, distant horizon to a threatening “shh!” in your ear. The dark vocal line groove loops back on itself, building an unsettling momentum, caught up by the chugging snare with the ascending / descending snakes and ladders noise rock guitar that is so distinctively Girl Band.
The video for Shoulderblades is directed by long-time collaborator Bob Gallagher, whose previous work with the band won him Best Irish Music Video at the Cork Film Festival and he was nominated for best director at the 2016 Berlin Music Video awards.
Bob on the video “I think it’s a real testament to the creative spirit of the band that they encouraged me to go outside my comfort zone and attempt to make something with no props or set dressing or conventional narrative, and to try and articulate an idea with dance and movement.
In Oona we found an incredible co-conspirator, I couldn’t imagine any other dancer being able to bring that combination of beauty and violence to the video. The idea grew out of Dara’s reference to the character of Ed Mordake, a man with two faces, so duality was a major theme. It was interesting for me to see how well dance allows an idea to live in the abstract so it can remain very open. It can mean what it means to the band, and also what it means to Oona and to myself. Hopefully that translates in a way that people watching it can find something in it to relate to, strange as it may be.”
Album Track listing
Prolix
Going Norway
Shoulderblades
Couch Combover
Aibophobia
Salmon of Knowledge
Akineton
Amygdala
Caveat
Laggard
Prefab Castle
Ereignis
