Sounding a bit like Robert Forster singing with The Smiths Band of Holy Joy have a new download single “Isn’t that just the life” out on Stereogram on August 10th. A video accompanies the download and there will be a select number of dates across the UK. An album follows in September.
I have been hand selected by The Working Man (lead by the hardest man in Blackburn) to listen to their new track “Big Bad John”. They advise me that they are not going to bore me on how they ‘merge different genres’ and ‘can’t be put into any category’ – they appreciate , like themselves, that I am very busy. A fascinating melange of differing things makes for a damn fine listen. It comes from a soon to be released album called “Lancashizer”. You can catch them at the Bierkellar in that Manchester on July 30th.
Ancient River‘s new album ‘Keeper of the Dawn’ stems from band founder James Burreto’s love of Italian horror films and the music of David Axelrod – some tracks are led by the vocals, others by the drums. The latest in a string of interesting albums the overall feel is airy psychedelia with space rock, shoegaze, and touches of Americana. Opening track “This is the Time” is a bit of a stunner.
Steve Hauschildt has announced his first new album since the late 2012 release of “Sequitur. Where All Is Fled” . It will be released via kranky on 25th September. Titled “Although Where All Is Fled” it sonically refers back to his earlier albums such as “Rapt for Liquid Minister” and “Tragedy & Geometry”, but on detailed listening it slowly becomes apparent that it is also a divergence from those recordings.
“Both the artwork and the music on this new work were heavily inspired by surrealist landscape paintings, early alchemical emblems, and recurring visions Steve had from dreams. The result is a pristine series of cascading melodies, fantastical terrains of layered lattices, and overlapping patterns of synthesizers superimposed with orchestral instrumentation. Hidden in the crevices of the album are processed crowd sounds, re-sampled text-to-speech synthesis, piano, and animal noises which reveal themselves after repeated listens and blur together notions of artificial and natural sound. While slowly unfurling, each sound is given it’s own place and space, never hurried, never cluttered.”
Helen is a pop group from Oregon featuring members of Grouper and Eternal Tapestry. Liz Harris (vocals/lead guitar), Jed Bindeman (drums/tambourine), Scott Simmons (bass/guitar), and Helen (back up vocals). Originally started with the intention of being a thrash band, it turned into something else entirely. “The Original Faces” was recorded over a period of several years in Portland by the band members, their friends Nick, Chris and, largely, Justin Higgins. The record was written together, with some songs based on Liz and Scottʼs demos.
And finally for this edition of Fascinating Things
Perhaps one of the most renowned personalities in the shoegaze / noise rock spheres, Oliver Ackermann (A Place To Bury Strangers, Skywave) has also lent his support to the cause. “It is a horrible tragedy this destruction of culture and life. I feel lucky that I can use my craft and contribute a song to this fund to help them raise money for relief. If we can all do something to help and give relief for the people of Nepal we should do it now.”
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