High on Sea Change vibes today with new music from Maps, DoomSquad and Death & Vanilla... and thats just the start of it!
Hello, Friends.
A triple set of Sea Change 2019 artists releasing new music today and it's got us in a spin. Maps return with new LP Colours. Reflect. Time. Loss. on Mute and it is absolutely beautiful. Recorded in part with classical ensemble The Echo Collective, it's expansive and sonically decadent, a really very beautiful album. Malmo-based Death & Vanilla release their new album Are You a Dreamer? on Fire Records. The coolest retro-futurism, waves of filmic tones and some really great hooks. Toronto electro-psychedelics DoomSquad drop an absolute treat on Bella Union with Let Yourself Be Seen. Politically tense, but super good fun with tones taken from the last forty years of dance music, synths to grizzled electro bangers. Exciting stuff.
+ Buy Maps on limited white vinyl.
+ Buy Death & Vanilla on limited pink vinyl (with lush deluxe grey textured board sleeve)
+ Buy DoomSquad on limited white vinyl.
We're actually so busy organising various Sea Change things that we're unable to travel up to London tonight for the Music Week Awards. We've been nominated (we know, our perennial bridesmaid appearance) as Best Independent Retailer which is very kind, but also for our Dinkedcoalition which is being recognised as an innovator... nice. We can't go to London and get drunk, but we'll gladly pop some corks down here.
We've said it before, we'll say it again... and again. Clinic are one of the finest bands of the last twenty-five years and we are HYPED to have them back (after a seven year gap) with their seventh studio album Wheeltappers and Shunters. Gloriously warped surf-rock with drones and reverbs that hide some very smart writing in layers of oozing and woozing. The album's twelve tracks are done and dusted in under half an hour, not a moment wasted.
+ Indies exclusive edition on opaque red heavyweight vinyl.
Dr. Holly Herndon releases her third full-length album PROTO on 4AD and it is our May album of the Month. It is a record created in collaboration with her own A.I. baby, an entity called Spawn. It glistens with electronic flourishes and waves of vocal treatment, but it's a very organic feeling album. It is in fact one of the warmest electronic albums in years. Occasionally you get those academic gestures in music that are smart, brilliant but kind of dull... PROTO is the antithesis of this... a wildly creative record that is exciting, challenging and totally inspiring.
"Often stories of new technology are laden with the anxiety of being replaced - being bettered by something that has a more calculable claim to existing, but with Proto, Holly Herndon explores the possibility of true collaboration with the mechanical" - The Quietus
Mac DeMarco returns with Here Comes The Cowboy on his own 'Mac's Record Label' imprint. Both feet here are planted in the slow-slacker-soul side of what he does, but there are some really nice moments in there to mix it up, It's those little gestures that will keep you coming back.
+ Indie Shops Exclusive. Green and Black Mix Vinyl with Reverse Sleeve Artwork housed in Gatefold Sleeve with Insert.
Efrim Manuel Menuck, founding member of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Thee Silver Mt. Zion and Kevin Doria from Growing and Total Life, are now officially a duo. They release Sing Sinck, Sing today on Constellation and it is full of intense building songs, quite spiritual stuff.
Jamila Woods releases Legacy! Legacy!. A modern soul record thats all about her voice, both politically and also one of huge charm.
+ Limited Indie version pressed on pale pink coloured vinyl.
The mighty Dipped In Gold Recordings release Life Cinema from London based USA Nails. Gritty, noisy and messy, great stuff.
A very welcome return (eight years!!) from A.A. Bondy with new Enderness. A very good set of songs that he performed and recorded entirely by himself. The day after he finished, wild fires burned down the house he recorded it in!
Pakistani-American composer Qasim Naqvi's Teenages album dropped last week on Erased Tapes but we just missed telling you about it. That is in stock now and very much worth checking out. Also last week and also in stock is the Versing 10000 LP on Hardly Art. The Seattle quartet find the sweet spot between feel-good and massive noise. Really like this.
Versus Universe is the debut album from Scottish quartet Rev Magnetic, who meld elements of R&B, shoegaze and post rock into their singular, blissfully spacial dream pop. Bloody good.
Rosie Lowe releases YU on Wolf Tone. Only heard it once, but she really holds her own amongst some formidable guests, this might be a bit brilliant.
We have the very limited Sleaford Mods - Discourse 7".
James Blake's Assume Form has landed on vinyl (including a limited indie pressing).
RVNG INTL release Anthology Of Interplanetary Folk Music: Vol. 2: The Canon, the second chronicle of Craig Leon's work. It's pretty spectacular stuff.
Last one this week is a treat in a week of treats. Too Much Tension! is The Mystery Lights' sophomore album on Daptone's rock subsidiary, Wick Records. It finds the group digging deeper into their well of eclectic influences, enriching their sound without echoing the past. They're so good!
Loads right?! Have a great end of week and we're so hyped that so many of you regular record crew are joining us for Sea Change. We've nearly sold out of the local allocation, really glad to welcome so many of you from out of town. Not long!
- Drift