Rachel Silver

Watch the new video from Golden Fable for ‘Breathe In’

The song ‘Breathe In’ tells a tale of frustration, fear and urgency. Shot in and around Cardiff, the Welsh creative team at Storm and Shelter have carefully crafted a visual representation of this, interwoven with performances from the band. A man and woman embrace each other underwater, but the woman becomes lifeless, starved of oxygen. In desperation the man pushes her to the surface, chasing the breath that will save her. The video was directed and produced by Josh Bennett, Gruff Vaughan and Nick Patterson.

Golden Fable are Rebecca Palin, Tim McIver and Jack McCarthy, and together they create music described by The Line Of Best Fit as “nothing short of inspirational”. Hailing from the foothills of mountainous north Wales, Golden Fable compose their music within its abundant, richly varied landscape. Pairing these organic influences with modern instrumentation, debut album, Star Map released in 2012 was constructed from electronic beats, synths and processed effects alongside guitars, pianos and strings.

Twelve months of writing and evolving followed, and the band resurfaced from their creative retreat with second album, Ancient Blue. Recorded with David Wrench (Bat For Lashes, Caribou) and Jimmy Robertson (Anna Calvi) in Snowdonia, Ancient Blue is impassioned, intense and bolder than its predecessor. It is both strident and intimate, reflecting the intrinsic connection between human forces and natural forces.

Throughout Ancient Blue, Golden Fable move effortlessly between the heart-wrenching stillness of Low or Dead Can Dance, and the textured, melodic electronica of The Album Leaf or M83. ‘Breathe In’ utilises synths, electronic drums and a much fuller guitar sound to create a buoyant, boisterous mood.

Golden Fable’s deliciously haunting sound has received extensive radio play and wowed crowds at End of the Road, Bestival, Green Man and SWN festivals. The band have toured with Field Music, Cherry Ghost and Wave Machines.

The Breathe In EP includes the new single ‘Breathe In’ and three non-album tracks, it will be released on 27th October. The album, Ancient Blue will be released on 10th November on Full of Joy Records.

Golden Fable’s forthcoming shows:
Friday 14th November – Wrexham, Galeri 3B
Tuesday 25th November – London, Madame JoJos (White Heat)
Tuesday 2nd December – Chester, Telford’s Warehouse

Goat unveil new video for ‘Hide From The Sun’

Splendid second studio set from Sweden’s hardest-rocking ritualist ruminants” – Mojo

“The African elements consistently elevate Commune to a higher, fierier plane” – Wire

“Masked festival favourites continue their worldwide masquerade” – Uncut

“A follow-up record that oozes with a confident, natural progression and succeeds in being both a continuation and evolution of ‘World Music’” – Loud & Quiet

“Commune is a truly artistic statement.” – The Quietus

“The hypnotic epiphanies of oat make for an extraordinary experience.” – Classic Rock

“You get the feeling that Goat could just keep this sinuous groove going forever.” – The Observer

“One of the world’s most exciting live acts.” – NME

GOAT’s Commune is the Swedish collectives critically acclaimed follow up to 2012’s World Music. It has become their first UK Top 40 Album and a Billboard Top 200 albums chart debut. Now it has spawned their first ever official video.

‘Hide From The Sun’ was directed by Sam Macon (Dum Dum Girls “Bedroom Eyes”) and features artwork from Stacey Rozich (character illustrations in Fleet Foxes “The Shrine / An Argument”). Sam and Stacey collaborated closely to create a dark, psychedelic, mythical trip across three distinct worlds. As Sam states, ” It isn’t a story set in the past, nor is it a story set in the present or future. It simply exists in its own realm.”

The hypnotic World Music introduced us to the mysterious, masked music of GOAT. They have awed the world since with their intense, ritualistic live shows, playing festivals such as Glastonbury, Coachella, SXSW, Latitude, Incubate, Liverpool Psych Fest and a recent sell-out European tour. This has continued with the release of Commune, and now ‘Hide From The Sun’ gives us even more insight into the world that is GOAT.

Commune is out now on Rocket Recordings.

The Coathangers release new album and announce tour dates!

“this time around, the band are firing on all cylinders” – Pitchfork

“their punk rock beats have been the perfect soundtrack to our weekend shenanigans for the past seven years.”  NYLON

“tightly controlled sense of menace and impending chaos” – Paste

“Top 5 Most Overlooked Albums of 2014” – SPIN 

 

If you’re familiar with The Coathangers then you probably know the Atlanta group’s premise. The story goes that four young women decided to start a band for the sole purpose of being able to hang out and play parties. They weren’t going to let the fact that none of them knew how to play any instruments get in the way of their having a good time.  The backstory certainly added to the charm of early songs like “Nestle In My Boobies” and “Stop Stomp Stompin’”–songs that resided somewhere between no-wave’s caustic stabs of dissonance and garage rock’s primal minimalism.  In the seven years since their formation, The Coathangers have released a slew of records and toured across North America and Europe countless times. The persistence of such a casual endeavor is a testament to the infectious quality of their songs and the electric nature of their unruly live show.

Suck My Shirt is the The Coathangers’ fourth full-length.  The title refers to an incident involving the salvaging of spilled tequila during the recording session for the album.  While the title implies that little has changed with regards to the band’s celebratory mission statement, even just a cursory listen of their latest album demonstrates that there have indeed been changes in The Coathangers’ camp.  First off, the quartet was reduced to a trio for the latest record, with keyboardist Bebe Coathanger (Candice Jones) stepping down from her duties. But the absence of keyboards isn’t nearly as noticeable of a difference as the band’s refined songwriting approach.  Refinement is an attribute we expect to see in any group that has a career spanning more than a couple of years, but the extent to which The Coathangers have honed their trade with each successive album dwarfs most bands’ maturation.  This isn’t to say that The Coathangers have polished their sound; the group once again worked with Ed Rawls and Justin McNeight at The Living Room to attain the same production values of their Larceny & Old Lace album and their recent slew of split 7”s. Rather, the refinement can be heard in the quality of the songs themselves. While the band retains the alluring spontaneity and happy accidents of their early releases, the trio’s current work sounds far more deliberate and locked-in than anything they have done in the past.

“It’s a balance between overthinking and just going for it,” guitarist Crook Kid Coathanger (Julia Kugel) says of their songwriting strategy.  It’s a duality immediately apparent with the album opener “Follow Me”.  It’s a classic Coathangers tune with the raspy vocals of Rusty Coathanger (Stephanie Luke) belted out over the signature grimy rock laid down by Crook Kid and bassist Minnie Coathanger (Meredith Franco).  But the chorus opens into one of the most accessible hooks in the band’s canon, just before segueing into the next verse with a squall of violent dissonant guitar.  From there the band launches into “Shut Up”, a title that harkens back to the brash sass of their first record. The song still has its spikey guitar riffs and shouted chorus, but here The Coathangers sound less like a jubilant version of Huggy Bear and more like the art-pop of late-era Minutemen.  Dedicated Coathangers fans will recognize the re-worked versions of “Merry Go Round”, “Smother”, “Adderall”, and “Derek’s Song” from their run of limited edition split 7”s, and hearing them in the context of the album shows that these tracks weren’t merely isolated examples of the band’s more sophisticated side, but were actually demonstrative of the group’s increasing capacity for nestling solid melodic hooks and rock heft into their repertoire.  By the time the band wraps up the album with the humble pop perfection of “Drive”, it’s hard to believe this was the band that garnered their reputation with raucous bombasts like “Don’t Touch My Shit”.

“Ultimately, every album is a snapshot of who we were at the time,” says Crook Kid.  And while that might mean that The Coathangers in 2014 don’t feel compelled to chronicle the youthful piss and vinegar that yielded the Teenage Jesus & The Jerks-esque spasms of their debut album, it’s exciting to hear the output of the band as they explore the range of their temperaments with a broader musical palette at their disposal.

Suck My Shirt will be released in the UK on 3rd November 2014 via Suicide Squeeze Records.  The band will be touring Europe in November.

 

UK dates:
12th November, Leeds – Wharf Chambers
13th November, Glasgow – Broadcast
14th November, Birmingham – Temple (with The Growlers)
15th November, London – Shacklewell Arms
16th November, Brighton – Prince Albert

Carnivores to release debut album and announce tour dates

Described by the NME as sounding like “Weezer being beaten up by The Dillinger Escape Plan”, Carnivores draw influence from Fugazi, At The Drive-In, Idlewild, Helmet, Elvis Costello and Nirvana.Carnivores are a three-piece rock band based in Paisley, Scotland.  Formed by college friends, Kenny Leckie and Grant MacCall – Carnivores got to work the old fashioned way, touring every venue imaginable in Scotland in their battered estate car, building a fans show by show.  They have gained a reputation as one of the hardest working and incendiary live bands in Scotland – taking on guerilla gigs in abandoned buildings, countless house parties and most impressively 450ft up in the Glasgow Science Centre Tower, the tallest fully rotating structure in the world.

After hitting their stride with a series of self-released EP’s and singles, Carnivores went on to play T in the Park, headline Glasgow’s King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut and playing Glasgow Barrowland at a sell-out show supporting Twin Atlantic.  In 2013, the band replaced David with new drummer Martin Johnston and got down to making their debut album, Let’s Get Metaphysical.  Recorded live in just six days with producer, Bruce Rintoul (Twin Atlantic/Fatherson), the album captures the raw intensity of the band’s live show matched with a more melodic, introspective aspect to Carnivores sound.

A strong theme on Let’s Get Metaphysical is about looking at the world that we’ve inherited from previous generations and seeing how irresponsible those generations have been with it – Kenny explains “We’ve all been brought up in working classing households and the people that our parents and grand-parents put trust in have sold out the working classes in a big way.  In a song like ‘Lion Tamer’ we’re singing about our home towns but it could be anywhere in the UK, the same with ‘The Second Wave of Yuppie Scum’, it’s about someone specific to us turning out to be a class traitor – I think that’s a feeling that everyone can relate to.”  Leckie continues, “Most rock music you hear these days is very polished and homogenised. We wanted to go the opposite way and make something that was musically and emotionally very raw and real. It’s just three guys in a room playing loud rock music. Lyrically, it’s like an open wound, for better or worse it’s practically a diary of the last six months of my life”.

Scotland is a nation in a state of flux, with many important decisions for its inhabitants ahead. Let’s Get Metaphyscial provides a state of the nation address from young men in touch with their history and a strong sense of what lies ahead.  But just how ‘metaphysical’ is this record?  “I’m an armchair metaphysicist” admits Kenny, “I’m not ashamed to admit that all my knowledge on philosophy comes from Wikipedia.  We had a Soren Kiekergaard quote on our first EP, I only know him because he was mentioned in Wayne’s World.  Where’s my honorary doctorate at?”

Carnivores debut album, Let’s Get Metaphysical will be released on 27th October on Smalltown America.

TOUR DATES
18/9: Glasgow, Bar Bloc
25/9: Edinburgh, Opium
26/9: Stewarton, Stewarton Arms
27/9: Inverness, Mad Hatters
02/10: Ayr, UWS Union
13/10: Aberdeen, Downstairs
15/10: Sheffield, South Sea
16/10: Cheltenham, The Frog & Fiddle
17/10: London, Camden Barfly
18/10: Derby, The Victoria Inn
24/10: Paisley, Bungalow Bar
25/10: Glasgow, 13th Note Cafe

Die! Die! Die! release new album entitled SWIM

Dunedin’s punk sons of the modern age, Die! Die! Die! will be releasing their fifth album SWIM on 6th October and have shared a slice of things to come with the unveiling of the video for ‘Get Hit’.  The concept for the pugilism-themed clip came straight from the mind of frontman, Andrew Wilson and has been interpreted for the screen by director Ryan Harte of Slow Pulse Studios.  Ultimately the track speaks to fighting your demons which has been illustrated by a boxer fending off an invisible opponent, and while he catches a few blows to the face he is ultimately left standing.

SWIM is an 11-track opus formed from the wall-sweat of Europe’s best clubs, scratched off the tour van floor and from down the back of the couch-surfed accommodation.  Produced by the band and Chris Townend  (Portishead, D12, Violent Femmes) from The Lab in Auckland to Lightship 95 in London, SWIM’s sparse geographical consummation is as expansive as their definition of punk and pop music.

As an internet acronym for ‘someone who isn’t me’, SWIM’s title suggests that Wilson is stepping out of his own comfort zone lyrically and bringing new themes and broader strokes to the mighty crash and boom of Die! Die! Die!’s sound.

David Kilgour & The Heavy Eights to release new album!

The latest album from David Kilgour & the Heavy Eights was recorded in his native New Zealand between 2012 and 2014. That span covering three years suggests this might be one of those albums that was slaved over, with weeks-upon-months spent recording and then mixing until every minor detail was perfected.  The opposite is true.  End Times Undone took so long to finish because Kilgour assembled his bandmates every four or five months, and then only for a couple days at a time.

“We’ve become so obsessed with capturing the creative moment as early as possible when we get together,” Kilgour says of making music with guitarist Tony de Raad, bassist Tom Bell, and drummer Taane Tokona.

It’s the perfect way for Kilgour to operate these days, more than 30 years into a career that is equally compelling, consistent, and influential.  From his first recordings with The Clean, the iconic band who remain active and whose legend deservedly grows mightier every year, Kilgour has had a distinct sound that has inhabited all of his albums and sounds fresh with every new release.

If it sounds a little fresher on End Times Undone – Kilgour’s eighth solo album and second straight with this Heavy Eights line-up – that’s because of the method.  Not many bands can make musical discovery sound so leisurely and urgent, so crisp and casual.  But that’s what transpires over these ten tracks. Building on the chemistry showcased on 2011’s Left By Soft, Kilgour and the Heavy Eights were able to quickly coalesce around this batch of songs.

Over just ten songs, End Times Undone offers a robust sampling of all the various styles Kilgour has mastered over the last three decades.  For an album that comes so late in one’s career, it’s a surprisingly convenient entry point into Kilgour’s body of work.  After a psychedelic intro, opener “Like Rain” immediately identifies itself as vintage Kilgour, with shimmering guitars that gracefully swell and secede.  “Lose Myself in Sound” will appeal to fans of The Clean who favour songs where the band chugs along on a blissful straight-line path.  While the album has its share of abstract lyrics, this title is one to take seriously.  And like many songs here, it draws to a close with an extended instrumental passage, the sound of four people finding their own rhythm together.

End Times Undone will be released shortly after a reissue of The Clean’s Anthology, a 46-track set that serves as the band’s defining document that can attest to their pantheon status.  End Times Undone is a perfect companion piece to that collection that left off in 1996, and in many ways feels like it could have simply been the next album helmed by Kilgour instead of one that comes nearly 20 years later.

End Times Undone will be released on Merge in the UK on 1st September 2014.