The Fat Angel Sings

Gena Rose Bruce has followed up September’s single ‘Foolishly in Love’ with another Bill Callahan (SMOG) collaboration, the track ‘Deep Is The Way’. This time Callahan not only throws in with songwriting, but he contributes vocals as well. This single is the title track to Bruce’s newly announced album, scheduled for release on 27th January 2023 through Remote Control Records and Dot Dash Recordings.

On the collaboration with Callahan, Bruce says: Working with Bill was very poetic and brought a feeling of nostalgia. We have only ever had written correspondence, sending lyrics back and forth to each other, with sometimes weeks in between responses, just analysing lyrics, there was no small talk, just keeping it about what’s important – the music.

‘Deep Is The Way’ is profoundly moving and stately – delivered as a yearning ballad with Bruce’s gorgeous, melancholy vocals dipping in and around Callahan’s more gravelled and grounded contribution. Added to this there is a strong antipodean flavour, drenched in the languid sunshine and bright blue skies with a hint of darkness lurking deep inside.

The instrumentation is sparse and evocative – gently unfolding and undulating beneath the vocals.

Bruce says of the track: I think it can sometimes be overwhelming trying to find your place or ‘your thing’ in life. This song really is a dedication for those people who may be slower in finding themselves, who like to dream, think deeply and take their time to make decisions, for them to appreciate and honour their thoughtful process. Not everyone has to keep up with this unachievably fast and competitive world.

Bruce’s songwriting and delivery is soaked in a sensuous frame, achingly beautiful vignettes that are delicate yet powerful and filled with a profound sense of longing and regret.

The song is accompanied by a luscious video, directed by Alex Badham, a student of the legendary filmmaker Werner Herzog. The short film was shot during the pandemic in Europe and Australia and features empty, lonely spaces, but as it progresses, it pans out to wider landscapes offering a feeling of comfort and hope. On this feeling, Badham says:

I totally fell in love with this song, having had some clichéd romantic moments listening to it whilst wandering the rainy streets of Berlin. I wanted to incorporate some of the seedy city vibe in the video. I had lots of travel going on and Gena had the idea of utilising this opportunity to make a slow and dreamy collection of empty spaces. I was lucky enough to visit some interesting and varied places over this period, Tenerife particularly has some amazing spots in such a tiny land mass – lush forests, black beaches and volcanic moonscapes. I also went into quite a few Berlin bars, asking on the spot if I could get a shot (with my camera) and a shot (of booze) and accidentally got a little shitfaced at times, oops. I’m pleasantly surprised by how emotionally moving it turned out, given how simple it is – a fairly straightforward concept about escaping the city and exploring the world outside.

Gena Rose Bruce’s second album. Out January 27th 2023 on Dot Dash Recordings.

Softcult is the Canadian grungegaze duo of twins Mercedes and Phoenix Arn-Horn, who both used to play in Courage My Love, and they’ve got a new EP called “see you in the dark” arriving in spring of 2023. New single “Drain” is an atmospheric yet anthemic track that finds a middle ground between Siamese Dream and Soccer Mommy.

released November 2nd, 2022

From the outset, Judee Sill’s 1971 self-titled album exists at this wonderfully specific intersection of psychedelia and childlike whimsy. Opener “Crayon Angels” contains mentions of the astral plane, magic rings, mystic roses, and phony prophets, and followups “The Phantom Cowboy,” “The Archetypal Man,” and “The Lamb Ran Away with the Crown” all sound like fantastical fables in their lyrics.

Instrumentally, the album ranges from oboes and trumpets to strings to gentle drums and shakers, with Judee’s crystal-clear voice and acoustic guitar as constants. “The Lamb Ran Away with the Crown” bridges the album’s psychedelic nursery rhymes to its more earnest, biblically inspired middle section, including orchestral ballad “Lady-O” and enduring classic “Jesus Was a Cross Maker.” Judee’s voice is stark and unadorned and bears a comfort in its plainness, reminiscent of Peter, Paul & Mary’s music for children; even so, her ability to spin a deeply honest and intimate narrative makes her music perfect for listeners of any age and any time. This album was her first, released when she was 26 after a somewhat troubled childhood and early adulthood rife with drug addiction and a stint in jail. Despite its intricacy (thanks in part to Joni Mitchell engineer Henry Lewy and production by Graham Nash), the album was not a commercial success.

Her struggle with addiction continued through the ‘70s, ramping up as her music career waned. She died of overdose in LA in 1979 at the age of 35. Perhaps the most enduring statement on Judee Sill is the closing trio of “Lopin’ Along Thru the Cosmos,” “Enchanted Sky Machines,” and “Abracadabra,” ebbing and flowing from simple, imaginative ballad to gospel-like anthem to once again orchestral, harmonic masterpiece.

Judee Sill’s self-titled album contains as many layers as she does, and each listen reveals new truths, with one constant: “However we are is okay.”

You may recall that the original lineup of The Damned, Dave Vanian and Captain Sensible, who are still in the current line-up, and guitarist Brian James and drummer Rat Scabies who hadn’t played with the band in decades — were set to reunite for a few shows in 2021 to celebrate the 45th anniversary of The Damned’s debut single, “New Rose,” which was possibily the first UK punk single. Those got postponed due to the pandemic but the short tour kicked off this Friday at London’s Eventim Apollo.

“It’s the gig they said would never happen!” cracked Captain Sensible at the show, joking about the well-known acrimony between Vanian/Sensible and James/Scabies. But happen it did.

Walking out to the Doctor Who theme, the band stuck to material from their first two albums — including classics like “Neat Neat Neat,” “Problem Child,” and “Born to Kill” — plus covers they used to play around the time, including The Stooges’ “1970” which they retitled “I Feel Alright” for their debut album and opened the London show with. “It was even more garage than I remember back in the day,” Sensible said after the show. The encore opened with “New Rose,” and then they finished with covers of Bo Diddly’s “Pills” and The Rolling Stones’ “The Last Time.”

It was not the last time, though, as they played the Eventim Apollo again on Saturday with the same setlist and have three more reunion shows this week (Manchester, Glasgow, and Birmingham).

Check out the full London Night 1 setlist:

SETLIST: The Damned @ Eventim Apollow, London 10/28/2022
1970 (The Stooges)
You Take My Money
Help!(The Beatles)
Born to Kill
Stretcher Case Baby
Feel the Pain
I Fall
Fan Club
Alone
Fish
1 of the 2
Problem Child
Neat Neat Neat
Stab Yor Back
Sick of Being Sick
See Her Tonite
You Know
So Messed Up

Encore:
New Rose
Pills (Bo Diddley)
The Last Time (The Rolling Stones)

After Go-Betweens co-founder Robert Forster learned his wife Karin Bäumler had ovarian cancer, they decided to make music together as a way of coping, and they brought in their whole family, making the new album with their daughter Loretta and son Louis (former of The Goon Sax). “She’s a Fighter” is a powerful love song that uses only two chords and as many lines. “I had written my first two-line song.” Forster says. “I had just out-Ramoned The Ramones!”

Ever since we met, Karin and I have sung and played music together in our home, and in these dark days we turned to music once again. I had a batch of new songs I’d written over the last years, and we started playing them together. Our son Louis often dropped in for a meal and a chat and soon he began joining us on guitar. One night, when sitting cross-legged on the couch, after we had played a song, Karin looked up from her xylophone and said, ‘When we play music, is the only time I forget I have cancer.’ That was a big moment.

Robert Forster – “She’s A Fighter” Single taken from the new album “The Candle And The Flame”

For her first solo album in seven years, Meg Baird is moving beyond the more pure folk of previous albums in favor of a lush production style incorporating drums, synthesizers, and vibraphone into her sound — not to mention elements of shoegaze and trip hop. First single “Will You Follow Me Home” is a quiet stunner, swaying along a melotron breeze and a conga-powered groove, with Meg’s ethereal voice really making it soar.

“Furling” moves through the breadth of Meg’s musical fascinations and the environments around them—edges of memory, daydreams spanning years, loose ends, divergent paths, secret conversations under stars

Song from “Furling” by Meg Baird, out on LP/CD/Digital on January 27th, 2023 on Drag City.

Back in July, Pye Corner Audio (aka analogue synth wiz Martin Jenkins) released “Let’s Emerge!”, an album that traded his usual dark, retro electronic soundscapes for bright psychedelia, and half of the album’s 10 songs featured guitar and vocals by Ride’s Andy Bell (they’d collaborated before). Now Jenkins has handed over a few of that album’s songs to Sonic Boom (aka Pete Kember formerly of Spacemen 3) to work his magic on. These songs were already pretty blissed-out, but Kember sets the controls for the heart of the sun for what is at times the aural equivalent of the last 20 minutes of “2001: A Space Odyssey“. Coolest of the bunch: “Saturation Point,” which Kember refashions into Morricone-esque cinematic drama.

Pye Corner Audio releases an EP of remixes by Spacemen 3 legend Sonic Boom. “Let’s Remerge!” takes three tracks from the recent album “Let’s Emerge!” – which went to Number One in the Official Charts’ dance chart following its release in July – and gives them all appropriately weird and wonderful twists. ‘Haze Loops’ gets turned inside out, the smoke clearing to reveal some new shoots; Andy Bell’s guitar is brought to the fore on ‘Saturation Point’, keeping things together as the rest of the track spins out of control in the background, like a cross between Khruangbin and Ennio Morricone; previous single ‘Warmth Of The Sun’ is put through an acid blender, blurring all the edges and giving us one much-needed final hit of serotonin as the summer recedes into the distance.

released November 4th, 2022

Remixed by Sonic Boom, Sintra

Guitars by Andy Bell

Ride’s discography up through the early-’90s is pretty spotless, including their classic debut album “Nowhere”, one of the touchstone records of the OG shoegaze movement; their underrated second album, “Going Blank Again”, that found them expanding their sonic palette and emphasizing their voices as much as their guitar pedals; and four EPs that range from the youthful rush of “Ride” and “Play“, to the growing ambition of “Fall”, and the maturity and experimentation of “Today Forever”.

All are essential and have just been reissued by the band’s current label Wichita Records. All of these originally came out when vinyl was on the decline and more care was probably put into CDs than the records (and none of them got vinyl releases in the US at the time). “These are my favourite pressings ever of these albums,” Andy Bell told us. “Creation was an amazing record label but they didn’t press on the greatest vinyl. I’d rather have one of these new ones than an original any day.”

These reissues, which are also on CD, mark the first time the four EPs have been collected into one complete (triple album) set, and “Going Blank Again” now comes with four great b-sides from the era, including the song “Going Blank Again.” The biggest downside is they are currently UK-only, as the North American rights are controlled by Warner Music (they were signed to Sire in the U.S.). Hopefully they’ll see release here sooner than later, but for those who want it now will have to fork over for international shipping.

Caitlin Rose has shared another taste of her first album in nearly 10 years, “Cazimi”, and it’s a dose of breezy, upbeat Americana.

We’re two weeks away from the release of Caitlin Rose’s first album in nine years, “Cazimi”, and today brings new single “Getting It Right,” an infectious alt-country song that finds Caitlin harmonizing with Courtney Marie Andrews. “Several years ago, I fell in love with Courtney’s first album,” Caitlin said. “I had been doing co-writes for a while, but realized I needed to start focusing in on the writers and artists I really wanted to collaborate with.

In February of 2020, singer-songwriter Caitlin Rose settled in at Nashville’s Sound Emporium Studios for a week of tracking with William Tyler, Brian Kotzur, Jack Lawrence, and Luke Schneider. After a seven year absence following the release of her sophomore LP, “The Stand-In”—a self-described Sisyphean nightmare of false starts and career blocks—Rose was ready, with the encouragement of close friend and producer Jordan Lehning, to give the rock a final push. “It happened so fast that there was no time to worry about what could go wrong; all I walked in with was the excitement,” she says. When she and Lehning planned to return for overdubs in early March, neither expected that the world would turn on its head in little more than a week, that a tornado would soon wipe half of east Nashville off the map, or a global pandemic would, as it has for so many others’ projects, further delay completion.

I wasn’t really being set up on things that were fulfilling that desire so I snuck into her DM’s and proposed a write whenever she was in town. Luckily she was already in town and we spent an extremely hot afternoon on the patio talking astrology and music and walking away with what I always thought of as a bit of a banger.” 

Paradoxically, though, sitting with her songs a little longer turned out to be exactly what Rose needed. “I had all the pieces,” she says. “It just took a while to make them fit. The initial charge of going into the studio with people I trusted and seeing it through was so inspiring, and then the world just stopped. It was a terrifying shift, but Jordan set the path for us and figured out how to utilize this new uncomfortable freedom of time. It led to a process more joyful than any I’ve experienced making music.”

Taking its title from the astrological term for when a planet is in such close, specific proximity to the sun that it’s considered to be in the heart of it, “Cazimi” finds the listener at the moment with its examination of trauma, chronicling “the slow motion unraveling of somebody’s life” in the aftermath. The thing about cazimi is that it’s fleeting, accidental, even—a moment of exaltation that goes just as fast as it comes. It’s a phenomenon that Rose could relate to: “I was never prepared to take on everything that happened to me in my early twenties. Being all of a sudden thrust into spotlights that I had little business being under was rarely empowering, often more so debilitating, and being in the rush of it all, I never could quite catch up,” she explains. “I was living that ‘combust to the sun’ narrative and the burnout was inevitable”

Caitlin Rose’s new album ‘Cazimi’ which is out everywhere November 18th.

Squeeze’s new EP, “Food For Thought”, is raising money for independent UK food banks. It features new and live recordings of five of their songs, and the title track is a new one, written by Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook. “It’s terrible and wrong that so many people have no choice other than the help that food banks provide to feed their family,” Glenn says. “That there are so many people who have to choose between food and heating is a disgrace.”

As we prepare to embark on our Food For Thought 25 date UK tour, we’re excited to announce the release of a new six track EP on November 4th 2022. The title track, ‘Food For Thought’, is a brand new song written by Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook, that is a pithy commentary on society, the cost of living crisis, and the increasing reliance on food banks.

“It’s terrible and wrong that so many people have no choice other than the help that food banks provide to feed their family.  That there are so many people who have to choose between food and heating is a disgrace,” said Glenn Tilbrook.

Also included on the EP are new recordings of ‘The Very First Dance’ and ‘Electric Trains’ as well as live recordings of ‘In Quintessence’, ‘Slap and Tickle’ and ‘The Day I Get Home’ recorded at the Liverpool Philharmonic.

Profits from the EP, which will be released digitally world-wide and sold on CD at the upcoming UK shows, will go to independent UK food banks.

Right now, millions of people across the country are facing a cost of living crisis as food and energy prices soar and families are feeling the biggest squeeze on incomes in a generation. That’s why attendees on the tour are being invited to bring along food donations to the shows, where there will be collection points across the venue each night. There will also be collection buckets for any cash donations.  All donations will be distributed to people in crisis across the 1,300 food bank centres in the Trussell Trust network.  Here is a link to information on the items that are requested: https://www.trusselltrust.org/get-involved/ways-to-give/donate-food/. Previous tours by Squeeze and Glenn Tilbrook have raised tonnes of food and thousands of pounds for the charity.

Emma Revie, CEO of The Trussell Trust, said “The cost of living crisis is impacting all of us, but for people on the lowest incomes it means they cannot afford the essentials such as heating or food. We are extremely grateful to Squeeze and all of their fans for kindly donating to the Trussell Trust from their tour, their generosity will help us ensure that food banks across the UK are able to continue delivering vital support this winter.”

“Food for Thought” on Love Records Released on: 2022-11-04