New wave / No wave – 7th Level Music

Review: Church Chords – elvis, he was Schlager

elvis, he was Schlager, the debut album from Church Chords, is difficult to describe, but that’s part of what makes it so good.

Combining recorded field sounds and samples with live performances in the studio, the album is a blend of musical influences from three cities: Philadelphia, Chicago, and Los Angeles. It’s the brainchild of producer / multi-instrumentalist Stephen Buono, who decided to become more of a producer / bandleader / circus ringmaster with a wide number and variety of musicians from those three cities.

The result is a neat experimental record that somehow blends electro, post-punk, psych-rock, jazz, and other stuff I can’t quite define into sort of a calm chaos. It’s like the album cover, a woman stopped along a roadway while forest burns immediately next to her and she records the growing danger on her phone…or perhaps is reciting her thoughts for future meditations.

Songs like “Recent Mineral” and “Apophatic Melismatic” combine killer bass riffs with soft vocals and hip-hop drums. “Spacetime Pauses” reminds me of some of MC 900 Foot Jesus‘ jazz-psych fusion tracks.

Songs like “Warriors of Playtime” bring in wild jazz horns and prog-rock guitars. “She Lays of a Leaf” has industrial beats and, I think, vocals from Chicago alt-rockers Finom to make it a weird robot-dance / lounge club groover that builds into something that would fit into a late 1970s French erotic thriller. “Owned By Lust,” on the other hand, would fit into a modern horror film with its panicked guitar licks and rambling madman vocals.

“Then Awake” has sultry vocals over a synth-bass line that moves like a snake across a sand dune at midnight. “Man on a Wire” reminds me of some Siouxsie and The Banshees tracks with the vocal stylings, goth synths, and post-punk saxophone and beats. The vocals on “I Hope You See” are layered with extra effects to almost make them unintelligible, but also make them more ethereal.

In case you’re wondering, as I was, “Schlager” is a type of European pop music characterized by catchy beats and love-song lyrics. I suppose Elvis Presley was that for many of the masses. This record has catchy beats and love-song lyrics, but it’s not Schlager. It’s too experimental, too stream-of-consciousness, too odd.

But it’s not too much of any of that either. It’s one of the most interesting records I’ve heard so far this year.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Cody at Terrorbird Media.]

NORMANS unleash “Schloss Loss” from their upcoming debut album.

Southern California noise-punk band NORMANS share the last single today from their forthcoming debut self-titled album, to be released on January 12th, 2024 on Solid Brass Records. Hear/share “Schloss Loss” and 3 other singles on all DSPs HERE.

CvltNation recently launched the official video for “Murder Rich” HERE & on YouTube.

In 2021, in the lingering haze of the global pandemic and several nautical miles off the coast of Los Angeles in a broken down boat, Southern California natives and stalwarts of the local DIY music scene Matthew Reid (Blonde Summer) and Michael Perry Rudes (FEELS) decided it was time to embark on a new musical odyssey together; one that championed fearlessness, rawness, and above all, freedom.

NORMANS was born on the dirty streets of L.A. and baptized in the punk rich waters of Hermosa Beach; the city that gave us Black Flag, Redd Kross, Minutemen and more. Years of exposure and participation in the myriad of genres and sounds that make up the vibrant music scene resulted in a multi-genre-bending, bass and synth fueled cacophony that pays homage to the ghosts of Killing Joke, The Jesus Lizard, GVSB and The Birthday Party.

NORMANS have managed to stitch together elements of surf, post punk, noise rock and Wax Trax era electro-industrial music for a sound that is urgent, angry, and simultaneously danceable. Oozing with satire and shrouded in bizarre visual art and imagery, bassist and vocalist Matthew Reid explores issues of violence, drug use, and the terrified animal caged within us all. Where their musical journey takes them will keep us wondering. What is certain is the band’s willingness to propel themselves into uncharted waters, unlike the boat they started on just a few short years ago.

NORMANS will be available on LP and digital on January 12th, 2024 via Solid Brass Records. Pre-orders are available for North America HERE, UK/EU orders HERE.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Dave at US / THEM Group.]

Church Chords releases “She Lays on a Leaf” from their upcoming album due Feb. 23, 2024.

Stephen Buono (by Matt Gribben) / Finom (by Alex Viscius) / Nels Cline / Ricardo Dias Gomes

Last month, Church Chords announced their debut album, elvis, he was Schlager, set to release on February 23rd via Otherly Love Records. The collaborative recording project led by musician/producer Stephen Buono brings together accomplished musicians from his time spent in Philadelphia, New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles, to create music that honors experimentation and collaboration.

Today, Church Chords returned to share “She Lays on a Leaf,” their avant-pop krautrock featuring guitar from Nels Cline (Wilco) and vocals by Finom‘s Macie Stewart and Sima Cunningham alongside Ricardo Dias Gomes (Caetano Veloso), who also penned the song’s lyrics.

When asked about the track, Buono shared more about collaborating with Cline: “For this song, I asked Nels to imagine John McLaughlin playing the opening guitar solo on ”Mother Sky” by Can. I think the solo on the alternate version is one of his best on record. It is such an integral part of the song that I gave him writing credit. On the album version, I love how co-producer John Herndon synthesized the solo to sound like I don’t know what.”

STREAM: “SHE LAYS ON A LEAF”

The story of elvis, he was Schlager, begins ca. 2016 in Chicago where Buono had relocated after four decades as a Philadelphia area resident, who frequently traveled to New York in his 20s & 30s soaking up the scenes at Tonic and The Village Vanguard. In Philly, in addition to his ubiquitous presence at a multitude of performances, Buono notably volunteered for the renowned avant garde presenter Ars Nova Workshop and put on his own live events at a series of West Philadelphia spaces. He also founded, wrote music for, and played guitar in the post-punk outfit, Split/Red, which BrooklynVegan called “Beefheart-ian….punk with an unbridled, avant-garde antagonism.”

Deeply embedded and inspired by the fertile music scene in the Windy City, where he moved at 38, he wanted his first Church Chords album to be fully Chicago-centric, using only locals. Buono oversaw a session at Steve Albini’s famed Electrical Audio that attempted to, as he puts it, “synthesize ‘electric-era’ Miles Davis with Black Sabbath.” A laudable experiment that he felt was ultimately a failure, opting to stick it in his back pocket for re-evaluation later on.

In Fall 2016 Buono relocated to Los Angeles and, a year to the day after his Electrical Audio session, dusted off the shelved material in a session with bassist Devin Hoff (Julia Holter, Sharon Van Etten), percussionist John Herndon, and multi-instrumentalist Ben Boye (Ty Segall, Bonnie “Prince” Billy). The trio laid down new rhythm tracks for six songs from the original session — a 35-minute continuous improvisation that changed the dynamic and structure of the work. In addition, Buono produced an additional 4 songs from tracks laid down by Chicagoan multihyphenate Jim Baker on ARP2000. Elliot Bergman (Wild Belle) produced one of these songs, “Recent Mineral” aka “Renda,” which has versions in both English and Portuguese.

For the next little while, Buono started massaging this mass of material into shape alongside co-producers in the vein of a hip-hop producer. As he did, more voices and players from an equally vibrant L.A. scene were folded into the proceedings. Among them, keyboardist Sam Barsh (Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar); guitarists Nels Cline, Jeff Parker (Tortoise), Mark Shippy (US Maple), Brandon Seabrook; horn player Josh Johnson (Leon Bridges’ musical director); percussionist Kenny Wollesen (Bill Frisell, Tom Waits); and Nate Walcott (a multi-instrumentalist known for his work with Bright Eyes, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Phoebe Bridgers).

It was at this point that Buono made some crucial decisions related to the album and the Church Chords project as a whole. The biggest was that he opted to lessen his contributions as a performer; to instead take on the role of a producer in the mode of Teo Macero or a member of Public Enemy’s Bomb Squad. He would be directing the sessions and helping finesse the finished product but otherwise staying out of the musicians’ way as they wrote lyrics and improvised.

As well, Buono decided early on that the material he was conceptualizing for elvis, he was Schlager needed vocals, and lyrics. Through his many connections in the community, he became friends with Ricardo Dias Gomes, a Brazilian artist who has worked with the likes of Caetano Veloso and Arto Lindsay. Initially, Gomes was going to contribute lyrics to a single song, but as he heard more of the music, he was inspired to write words for the majority of the tracks. Also making vital contributions were multi-instrumentalist/producer Matt Mehlan, who wrote “Warriors of Playtime,” a powerful song written in the wake of George Floyd’s murder; and old friend Kristin Slipp (Dirty Projectors, Mmeadows) who contributed words and vocals to “Alone, Under The Water” and several others.

Gomes, Slipp, and Mehlan’s lyrics were treated with immense care and compassion by the people Buono tapped to sing on elvis, he was Schlager. As with the rest of the album, the vocalists are an array of jaw-dropping talent from Genevieve Artadi, here singing in Portuguese for the first time on record, Brazilian Thalma de Freitas (Kamasi Washington, Madlib), electropop genius Takako Minekawa to L.A. dynamo zzzahara (the Simps) to the avant pop group Finom (f.k.a. Ohmme) to Ako Castuera, an artist who worked behind on Adventure Time.

The number of contributors and the storyline behind elvis, he was Schlager, is a little dizzying to comprehend. And it may sound like a recipe for a mess — a situation with too many cooks. But thanks to Buono’s steady hands guiding each step of the process, the album is a complete, cohesive statement. An exploratory, daring, and engaging expression of music’s transformative power. A mood piece that flows steadily and smoothly from vibe to vibe, guiding the listener through each melodic twist and rhythmic turn.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Cody at Terrorbird Media.]

Live: Mac Sabbath, Cybertronic Spree, and Playboy Manbaby – The Vogue – Indianapolis, IN – October 19, 2023

I took a friend to see three crazy bands in Indianapolis not long ago. Those bands were new wave / no wave punk rockers Playboy Manbaby, Transformer rockers The Cybertronic Spree, and “drive-thru metal” giants Mac Sabbath. He had no idea what to expect, and is pretty much a 1980s metal guy. He’d heard from another friend that Mac Sabbath were some sort of killer clown band, but that’s about it.

I hadn’t heard Playboy Manbaby either until this evening, and they were great. They came out looking like average dudes and then tore up the stage with a wild punk set and even held a mini-election in the crowd decided by a game of rock-paper-scissors.

“Oh wow…” was all my friend could say when The Cybertronic Spree came onstage in their Transformer outfits. He was even more stunned when they shredded for their entire set, playing originals from their new album, Ravage, and covers of fun tunes like AC/DC‘s “Thunderstruck” and Weird Al‘s “Dare to Be Stupid.” You have to be able to play well if you’re going to have a gimmick like this, and The Cybertronic Spree play very well. At one point, co-lead singer Arcee was hitting such high notes that my friend said he thought his eardrums were going to rupture.

“We’re the toy in your happy meal!” – Hot Rod on bass (3rd from left)

The “main course” was Mac Sabbath’s weird and wild rock / comedy show, full of heavy Black Sabbath parodies like “Sweet Beef” and “Frying Pan,” bad fast food-rock band puns (“Dokken Donuts,” “Dairy Queensryche,” “International Bauhaus of Pancakes,” etc.), water sprayed on the crowd, bizarre characters, and even a tribute to David Lynch‘s Blue Velvet and Roy Orbison.

Again, you have to be able to play well to do stuff like this, and Mac Sabbath have no problems doing so. Slayer McCheese can change riffs on a dime, The Catburglar is a sharp drummer and comedian, Ronny Osbourne never stops moving, singing, or joking when he’s onstage, and I don’t know how Grimalice plays bass in that outfit.

My friend was happy and dumbfounded by the end of the show. “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” he said. I hadn’t either, and I loved it. This was the last show of the first leg of their “More Than Meats the Eye” tour with the other bands, so don’t miss your chance to catch the second half.

Keep your mind open.

[Thanks to Annie at Adrenaline PR for the press passes!]

Rewind Review: Ian Dury – Hit Me! The Best of Ian Dury (2020)

Hit Me! The Best of Ian Dury is a great three-disc collection of Ian Dury classics, demo tracks, live cuts, new wave bangers, tenders ballads, and punk ragers from one of the best songwriters of his era.

Starting with two funky floor-fillers out of the gate, “Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll” and “Wake Up and Make Love with Me,” the compilation is already firing on all cylinders. I discovered Dury’s work through live versions of songs like this when I was in a record store in Bloomington, Indiana and the clerk was playing a live album from Dury and his killer band, The Blockheads. I thought, “Who is this?” and had been intrigued ever since. I snatched up this collection at a London record store as soon as I saw it.

It doesn’t disappoint. Ever. “Sweet Gene Vincent” pays tribute to one of Dury’s heroes. “Clevor Trever” and “Billericay Dickie” have Dury taking on alternate identities (Or are they?). “Blockheads” (with Dury singing / yelling toward the back of the room) ended up giving his future band their name. Dury is brutally honest with himself, and any female suitors, on the groovy “If I Was with a Woman.” “The Mumble Rumble and the Cocktail Rock” showcases Dury’s love of 1950s jukebox rockers. “Crippled with Nerves” (a song about his life with polio) showcases his love of country, gospel, and Elvis Presley, whereas “Blackmail Man” is a punk punch in the face…and that’s all on just the first disc.

Disc two starts with two more classics – “Reasons to Be Cheerful (Part 3)” and “Hit Me with Your Rhythm Stick.” “What a Waste” is sultry and slippery, reminding me of some of Frank Zappa‘s work, and the groove of “Inbetweenies” is outstanding. On “I Want to Be Straight,” Dury and the Blockheads are “sick and tired of taking drugs and staying up late.” The saxophone work on “Waiting for Your Taxi” is perfect for a late 1970s crime film. “Dance of the Screamers” turns into a psych-jazz freakout with disco beats behind it, showing us how the Blockheads were (are) one of the best bands out there. That hot disco groove continues on “Don’t Ask Me.”

“Mash It Up Harry” starts out disc three with a reggae twist (and, later, “Itinerant Child” continues it). “Dance Little Rude Boy” is another funky classic made even funkier by the electric piano work throughout it. The live version of “Spasticus Autisticus” is sharp as a razor and is a brief glimpse of how much the Blockheads were a murderer’s row of musicians. The guitar solo on “Bed O’Roses” is somewhere between a yacht rock anthem and a prog-rock ripper. The relentless rhythm of “Jack Sh*t George” is perfect for both a new wave club or even a late 1980s nighttime talk show theme. The disc, and the collection ends with a demo version of “England’s Glory,” which has a rough, raw edge to it that’s great, and it sounds like Dury and his band had a fun time in the studio that day.

This is a great entry point to Dury’s music, and it certainly made me want to find live albums by him.

Keep your mind open.

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The Serfs invite us to “Club Deuce” on their new single.

Cincinnati punks The Serfs, Trouble in Mind’s newest signing, announce their third album, Half Eaten By Dogs, out October 27th. It’s their best album yet, putting a decidedly Midwestern spin on the modernist twitch of future-forward bands like Total Control or Cold Beat, as well as the post-industrialist dance floor grime of Skinny Puppy, Dark Day, This Heat, and Factrix. Anyone paying attention can see that Cincinnati is a very real hotbed of musical creativity at the moment, and The Serfs – Dylan McCartney (vocals, percussion, guitar, bass, electronics), Dakota Carlyle (electronics, bass, guitar, vocals) and Andie Luman (vocals, synths) – are undeniably near the center of the city’s neu-underground scene. They are a deliberately nebulous and incidentally industrialist gang of dance-floor hymners – tranced-out troubadours whose sound and musical ideology seems to be a causal manifestation of their immediate environments.

Half Eaten By Dogs is a wide-eyed look through a scope into a heathenish vision, where ice-encrusted synth harmonies command oozing chemical rhythms and drilled-out elemental rock formations. There’s a psychedelic melancholy to it, in both the abstract lyrical sense, with doomed proclamations of natural and supernatural disasters, and the more tangible musical sense. It veers all over the map of tenebrous drum and synthesizers and stygian guitar, at times with a cautious paranoia and at times with tuneful defiance (and in some moments harmonica, saxophone or flute).

Today’s “Club Deuce” is a flat-out sexy floor filler. Its low-end sizzle is designed to make you move, and slither like a lurker at the threshold of the dance floor. “I thought of the idea for this song at first like a movie in my mind,” says Luman. “It was the story of a fated man and a modern day Venus with complete and unrelenting control. The set was a quiet corner in a thunderstruck city with endless commotion in the distance. The whole thing glowing like a neon sign. ‘Club Deuce’ churns unhurried until it billows all around you and you’re caught like a fly in the jaws of a venus fly trap.”

Listen to The Serfs’ “Club Deuce”

The Serfs, emerging like a missile from some surreptitious silo, were formed while McCartney and Carlyle were scraping the bottom of the barrel, tilling the soil for the baron (a.k.a. working the fryers at a pub) and generally wallowing in the puddles of despair. The two decided to express their grim outlook through self-hypnosis by way of drums and synthesizers. After a couple of bungled attempts to play live, Luman joined the band and the classic trio lineup was formed. Like their Ohio predecessors, The Serfs seem askew from the art that surrounds them, and they’re proud of it. Half Eaten By Dogs may be a step further down into the catacombs for the band, but if the principle of correspondence is correct, then they could be on their way to somewhere higher.

Pre-order Half Eaten By Dogs

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Jaycee at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Art Feynman is “Desperately Free” on his new single.

Today, Art Feynman — the recording alias of visual artist and producer Luke Temple — presents his new single, “Desperately Free,” from his forthcoming album, Be Good The Crazy Boys, out November 10th on Western Vinyl. Following lead single “All I Can Do,” “Desperately Free” keeps the grooves going, propelled by tropical-inflected percussion and infectious chants. “Something changed while I was sleeping,” the backing vocalists interject between Temple’s murmured incantations, “Somehow I feel different // as I go about my day.” Of “Desperately Free,” Temple adds: “I was thinking about the obsession with spiritual growth or with ‘curing’ death and the compensatory consequences that ensue as a result. We can’t cheat nature of which we are one and the same, she’ll find balance eventually.”

Watch Art Feynman’s “Desperately Free” Visualizer

Until now, Art Feynman has strictly been a solo act, a way for Temple to explore surprising sonic landscapes without the burdens of identity. Be Good The Crazy Boys was recorded live in-studio with a full band. The result captures a spirit of restless anxiety, and recalls the most frenetic work by Talking Heads, or Oingo Boingo at their darkest. “Sonically, I was inspired by records that were recorded at the late Compass Point Studios in the Bahamas such as Grace Jones’ ‘Private Life,’ Lizzy Mercier Descloux’s Mambo Nassau, and Talking Heads’ Remain in Light.” Despite these callbacks, Be Good The Crazy Boys remains firmly rooted in modern concerns, with songs about fearing the end of the world and struggling with FOMO — narratives that would be relatable if they didn’t sound so completely unhinged.

Slightly twisted takes on Kosmische musik, worldbeat, and art pop can be found scattered across the Art Feynman discography, but with Be Good The Crazy Boys, Temple fully immerses himself into pools of collective madness. With Be Good The Crazy Boys, Art Feynman proves to be more than just a character. He represents the part of the modern, collective consciousness that’s struggling to maintain balance in a toxic, chaotic world. In less skilled hands, that concept could result in a very somber listen. Fortunately, when Art Feynman gets his hands on the chaos of the modern age, it simply makes you want to dance.

Temple explains, “To me, there was a lot of energy that needed to be released as the result of living in isolation for six years. It also seems to speak to a general anxiety we’re all holding, but it’s expressed in a cathartic way.” It’s this acknowledgement of general anxiety that separates Feynman from the other fictional personas that have been cropping up in the music world lately. Feynman doesn’t sound suave, confident, or even heartbroken in these songs; it sounds like he’s on the verge of a panic attack.

Listen to “All I Can Do”

Pre-order Be Good The Crazy Boys

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Will Butler + Sister Squares frolic in the “Long Grass” with their debut single.

Will Butler + Sister Squares announce their new self-titled album out September 22nd on Merge and present its lead single/video, “Long Grass.” Sister Squares are Miles Francis, Julie Shore, Jenny Shore, and Sara Dobbs; what made them a musical unit was working with Grammy winner and Oscar nominee Will Butler. The resulting Will Butler + Sister Squares is a record with a warm, humane soul.

“I met Jenny—my wife!—in college, the year before I joined Arcade Fire,” says Will. “When I needed a band to tour Policy [Merge, 2015], I asked [Jenny’s sister] Julie to join because I trusted her musically. And I asked Sara, Jenny and Julie’s childhood friend, because I knew she was super talented,” says Will. “Antibalas (who I was drumming for) opened some Arcade Fire shows,” says Miles, who offered to play drums anytime Will needed. Will, Julie, Sara, and Miles jelled on tour and everyone worked on vocal arrangements. All along, Jenny contributed to recordings and general performance ideas, and she joined onstage in 2019.

“After Generations [Merge, 2020], I considered making a weird solo record. Me alone in the basement, etc., etc. Mostly I realized that what I wanted was the opposite,” says Will. He increasingly turned to the band for feedback on lyrics and song structures. He asked Miles if they’d produce the record.

“Will and I organically discovered our relationship as a production duo through making this album. We didn’t have to talk too much about things as they happened, because the music just flowed,” says Miles. “As a producer, working with Jenny, Julie, and Sara is the dream. They connect so innately. In one motion they can conjure a mood, or get at the root of a feeling.”

The band played a run of shows in August 2022, airing out studio ideas in live rooms. After coming home, the band regrouped at Figure 8 Studios in Brooklyn. The album, broadly, is equal parts from Figure 8, group experiments from Will’s basement, and sessions in Miles’ Synthia Studio.

“I had quit my band Arcade Fire very recently, after 20 years—maybe the most complex decision of my life. I had spent the preceding two years at home with my three children. I was 39 years old. I was waking up every morning and reading Emily Dickinson, until I had read every Emily Dickinson poem. I was listening to Morrissey, to Shostakovich, to the Spotify top 50. I had unformed questions with inchoate answers,” says Will. “But, honestly, I was feeling great about the record.”

The album projects widescreen emotional landscapes. Lead-off single “Long Grass” is like a Harry Styles song with 20 more years of life behind it. “I had read this novella called Jamila by a Soviet/Kyrgyz author named Chingiz Aitmatov from the ’50s,” says Will. “It’s about an artist looking back on his childhood in a small town in Kyrgyzstan in WWII. It’s about love, and becoming an artist, and melancholy, and vast landscapes with a single train track running through them. And it reminded me of young adulthood, of wandering moodily down the train tracks. Maybe the song is also about leaving behind the things that formed us, but trying to remember the world as it used to be?”

Will Butler + Sister Squares will tour in support of their new album this fall.

Watch the video for “Long Grass”

Pre-order Will Butler + Sister Squares

Will Butler + Sister Squares Tour Dates:

July 29-30 – Guelph, ON @ Hillside Festival

Sept. 23 – Brooklyn, NY @ Zone One

Oct. 3 – Los Angeles, CA @ Zebulon

Oct. 4 – San Francisco, CA @ The Independent

Oct. 6 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios

Oct. 7 – Seattle, WA @ Barboza

Oct. 8 – Vancouver, BC @ Biltmore Cabaret

Oct. 17 – Boston, MA @ Deep Cuts

Oct. 18 – Montreal, QC @ Bar le Ritz

Oct. 19 – Toronto, ON @ Lee’s Palace

Oct. 20 – Detroit, MI @ Loving Touch

Oct. 21 – Chicago, IL @ Sleeping Village

Oct. 22 – Cleveland, OH @ Grog Shop

Nov. 7 – Riga, LV @ Palladium

Nov. 10 – Berlin, DE @ Privatclub

Nov. 12 – Aarhus, DK @ VoxHall

Nov. 14 – Rotterdam, NL @ Rotown

Nov. 15 – Paris, FR @ Café de la Danse

Nov. 16 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique

Nov. 17 – London, UK @ ICA

Nov. 18 – Dublin, IE @ Whelan’s

Nov. 30 – Philadelphia, PA @ PhilaMOCA

Dec. 1 – Washington, DC @ DC9

Dec. 2 – Durham, NC @ Motorco Music Hall

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Tantrum Zentrum have simple advice for us all – “Don’t Be a Fascist.”

British / North American post-punk outfit Tantrum Zentrum present their new single ‘Don’t Be A Fascist‘, which is both well-timed and thematic given the crazy state of affairs in the world at the moment. The most unlikely love story ever – this song is about falling head over heals… with a fascist!

Based in London, Tantrum Zentrum’s members draw from the UK, Canada and the USA, music having brought them together like a magnet while living in London. Inspired by early 70s krautrock and late 70s New York no-wave bands, they deliver sonic dissonance and poppy hooks with great energy and style… imagine Killing Joke on happy pills.

This is the second of three songs recently recorded with renowned producer Steve Evans (Robert Plant, Siousxie Sioux, Goldfrapp). The earlier-released single ‘Der Leiermann’ is performed in German. And while the new single is performed in English, it contains a few Bosnian and corrupted German words for emphasis.

Made up of Vaat Dafuq (vocals, guitar), Sabine de Rousseau (guitar, vocals), Valhalla Schimmer (bass guitar) and Kur Putchnik (drums). Tantrum Zentrum makes hi-energy post punk interlaced with funk, goth and krautrock influences.

“‘Don’t Be A Fascist’ is a wartime love story. Inspired by the 80s Yugoslavian pop hit ‘Fa Fa Fašista’ (performed by Sarajevo’s Plavi Orkestar), the song tells a story as old as time itself: boy meets girl, and they fall in love. Then their country gets occupied by the German forces of the Third Reich, and the girl falls for the tall, handsome enemy soldier in a magnificent uniform. Needless to say, the boy is furious!” says Vaat Dafuq.

“We chose a bombastic title that may resonate with many even now. The release is accompanied by a humorous ‘explainer’-style video that shouldn’t be taken too seriously.”

With analogue synths, distortion and hypnotic drums played with Devo-esque precision, the band’s music shares elements of Krautrock pioneers Neu! and Faust, along with goth and no-wave experimentalists such as Sonic Youth, Glenn Branca and Theoretical Girls.

Tantrum Zentrum creates memorable live performances loaded with good energy, humour, excellent musicianship and in several languages. Always happy to play for their audience, they aim to get people moving, while fostering genuine connections and a sense of community. The band will be playing a number of club shows in the UK in support of this release.

“Don’t Be a Fascist” is available from fine music platforms, including Apple Music, Spotify and Bandcamp.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Shauna at Shameless Promotion.]

The Clientle release “Dying in May” at the end of May and ahead of their “I’m Not There Anymore” album due in July.

The Clientele — the cherished UK outfit composed of vocalist/lyricist/guitarist Alasdair MacLean, bassist James Hornsey, and drummer Mark Keen — presents “Dying in May,” the new single from their forthcoming album, I Am Not There Anymore, out July 28th on Merge. On “Dying in May,” Keen’s live drums weave around programmed drum and bass samples, creating something polyrhythmic and avant-garde. Following the serene lead single “Blue Over Blue,” “Dying in May” elucidates the range of genres The Clientele explore on I Am Not There Anymore, a 19-track journey that extends from light bossa nova beats to the band’s classic chamber pop.

Of the track, MacLean says: “I think ‘Dying in May’ is the first Clientele song with no guitar. It also has no chords, as such — it’s a drone, with french horn, cello and Mellotron. So the rhythm does a lot of the work — the drums and percussion are in 9/8, but the singing and instruments are in 4/4, so as each bar goes past, there’s a slightly different rhythmic emphasis. This was a complete accident, but I loved it when I heard it — the patterns are a bit disorientating, but there’s a pulse that goes through it. I almost feel I could dance to this, but not quite. It’s based on an Arabic flamenco rhythm.

“The words are all fragmented too — simple images repeating, like someone in a high fever. I took some inspiration from cante jondo, Spanish flamenco — there tend to be two or three very focused, repetitive images in the words. There was no way in hell I could play guitar along with these rhythms, so I scored out a simple melody which would leave space for the drums, and be something the bass could latch on to. By the end, the words go over and over, like someone beside themselves with grief. Hence the title. It’s a harrowing subject, but I think it’s presented with love — the song hopefully opens it out and lets some air in. It feels like an exorcism for me.”

Listen to The Clientele’s “Dying in May”
I Am Not There Anymore regularly evokes what MacLean calls “the feeling of not being real.” A lot of the lyrics were inspired by MacLean’s memories of the early summer in 1997, when his mother died. Though the album functions as MacLean’s way of mourning, he notes that he’s not the kind of songwriter who ever sits down with a theme in mind. It’s more that “the music will bring images and then those images link of their own accord.” It’s a general mood he’s chasing with these loosely connected recollections.

The previous Clientele album, 2017’s Music for the Age of Miracles, arrived after a seven-year hiatus and featured the band’s familiar wistful melodies and haunting echo. Recording for I Am Not There Anymorebegan in 2019 and continued piecemeal until 2022 — in part because of the pandemic, but also because the band wanted to experiment. “We’d always been interested in music other than guitar music, like for donkey’s years,” MacLean says. This time out, the trio incorporated elements of post-bop jazz, contemporary classical and electronic music. According to MacLean, “None of those things had been able to find their way into our sound other than in the most passing way, in the faintest imprint.”

Over The Clientele’s 32-year career, critics and fans have often described their songs with words like “ethereal,” “shimmering,” “hazy,” “pretty” and “fragile.” MacLean, though, has his own interpretation of the effect his music creates. “It’s that feeling of not being there,” he says. “What’s really been in all the Clientele records is a sense of not actually inhabiting the moment that your body is in.” I Am Not There Anymore, as MacLean says, is all about “the memory of childhood but at the same time the impossibility of truly remembering childhood… or even knowing who or what you are.”

This August, The Clientele will embark on a U.S. tour, featuring stops at Bowery Ballroom in New York City, Lodge Room in Los Angeles, Lincoln Hall in Chicago, and more. All dates are listed below and tickets are on sale now.

Watch The Clientele’s “Blue Over Blue” video

Pre-order I Am Not There Anymore

The Clientele Tour Dates:
Fri. July 28 – London, UK @ Rough Trade East
Wed. Aug. 9 – Somerville, MA @ Crystal Ballroom at Somerville Theatre
Thu. Aug. 10 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
Fri. Aug. 11 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts
Sat. Aug. 12 – Washington, DC @ Songbyrd
Sun. Aug. 13 – Durham, NC @ Motorco Music Hall
Tue. Aug. 15 – Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall
Thu. Aug. 17 – Los Angeles, CA @ Lodge Room
Fri. Aug. 18 – Pioneertown, CA @ Pappy and Harriet’s
Sat. Aug. 19 – Big Sur, CA @ Fernwood Tavern (inside)
Sun. Aug. 20 – San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel
Tue. Aug. 22 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
Wed. Aug. 23 – Seattle, WA @ Tractor Tavern

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]