The Fat Angel Sings

Cory Hanson and Ty Segall have decided to release the much anticipated single “She’s a Beam” along with “Milk Bird Flyer”. Both songs were recorded 5 years ago, and were recently rediscovered. They will be donating 100% of the first week’s sales of both songs to Black Lives Matter LA.

Peace and love to all.

originally released February 7th, 2021

Frankie Cosmos’ “Abigail,” one of the pawsitively awesome standouts from 2022’s “Inner World Peace”, is being released today as a new remix by Kero Kero Bonito, along with a new arrangement of the song by Greta Kline, and the original demo version.
 
Kline says, “‘Abigail’ is named after, and is partly about, a dog I saw on Petfinder years ago and became obsessed with. The album art is my drawn version of a real text exchange about her.”  
“Kero Kero Bonito is one of our favorite bands (collectively) and after we covered ‘Fish Bowl’ for their ‘remix’ album in 2017, they always said they would remix something of ours someday. They went above and beyond crafting such a fun & original track from the ‘Abigail’ stems for the Kero Kero Bonito remix.

“I’m excited to also showcase my ability as a producer by releasing a new arrangement of ‘Abigail (Casio Version)’ recorded entirely by me at home.

“The original demo of ‘Abigail (Great Scraps Demo)’ is a full verse shorter and super bare – it shows how much the band expanded it and brought it to life for the album version. I think it’s fun to let the listener in on some of the different ways a song can exist, it’s infinite!”
 
Frankie Cosmos has scheduled a autumn US tour in support of “Inner World Peace” and its expanded, digital deluxe edition “Clean Weird Prone“, both available now from Sub Pop Records.  

Chan Marshall aka Cat Power shares her takes on “Ballad of a Thin Man” and “She Belongs to Me” ahead of the November 10th release of “Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert”.

Cat Power after announcing her new live album Recorded November 5th, 2022 at London’s Royal Albert Hall, Sings Dylan concert finds Chan Marshall delivering a song-for-song recreation of one of the most celebrated live sets of all time. Dylan’s 1966 concert was the culmination of one of the most consequential tours in the history of rock & roll – when he electrified his songs, and by doing so enraged his devoted audience.

In November 2022, Cat Power took the stage at London’s Royal Albert Hall and delivered a song-for-song recreation of one of the most fabled and transformative live sets of all time. Held at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in May 1966—but long known as the “Royal Albert Hall Concert” due to a mislabeled bootleg—the original performance saw Bob Dylan switching from acoustic to electric midway through the show, drawing ire from an audience of folk purists and forever altering the course of rock-and-roll. In her own rendition of that historic night, the artist otherwise known as Chan Marshall inhabited each song with equal parts conviction and grace and a palpable sense of protectiveness, ultimately transposing the anarchic tension of Dylan’s set with a warm and luminous joy. Now captured on the live album Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert, Marshall’s spellbinding performance both lovingly honours her hero’s imprint on history and brings a stunning new vitality to many of his most revered songs.

Cat Power bring’s those songs to the Hall , performing them in the same order as Dylan himself: the first half of the show being an acoustic set before being joined by her electric band for the second half.

Held at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in May 1966—but long known as the “Royal Albert Hall Concert” due to a mislabeled bootleg—the original performance saw Bob Dylan switching from acoustic to electric midway through the show, which quickly became one of the most infamous moments in the history of popular music .

Cat Power Sings Dylan both honours Dylan’s imprint on history and brings a new perspective to many of his most revered songs, including “She Belongs to Me” and “Ballad of a Thin Man,” both of which are out now.

The upcoming album ‘Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert’ out November 10th on Domino Record Co.

Peter Gabriel’s long-awaited “I/O” still doesn’t have an official release date, but the ex-Genesis leader has spent much of 2023 releasing new material to mark full moons. He began with “Panopticom” in early January, which he’s chased with monthly entries like the Brian Eno collaborations “Four Kinds of Horses” and “Road to Joy.” Whenever it arrives, “I/O” will be the first all-new studio LP from Gabriel since 2010’s “Scratch My Back”.

Peter Gabriel has shared “So Much” , another stunning track from his upcoming studio album, “i/o”. It’s the seventh song released, which he’s been doing once each month in 2023 upon a full moon.

He’s supporting the album with an extensive tour that began in Europe on May 18th. (The tour resumes with a North American edition beginning on September. 8th.)

The first track, “Panopticom,” was released at midnight on January 6,th nearly two months after he announced plans for the tour last until November. “i/o The Tour” sees Gabriel playing new material from the forthcoming album, as well as delving into his extensive catalogue of music, with hits, fan favorites and “the unexpected.”

Written and produced by Gabriel, “So Much” features a string arrangement from John Metcalfe and contributions from Tony Levin on bass, David Rhodes on guitar and backing vocals from Peter’s daughter Melanie Gabriel.

“I was trying purposefully not to be clever with this,” says Gabriel. “I wanted to get a very simple chorus but one which still had some substance to the harmony and melody. Something that was easy to digest but still had a bit of character to it.

“‘So Much’ is about mortality, getting old, all the bright, cheerful subjects, but I think when you get to my sort of age, you either run away from mortality or you jump into it and try and live life to the full and that always seems to make a lot more sense to me. The countries that seem most alive are those that have death as part of their culture.”

The previous track, “Road to Joy,” features the Soweto Gospel Choir, a string arrangement from John Metcalfe and contributions from a number of Gabriel’s current touring band. The song is one of the last tracks to emerge for the “i/o” record, but it has some DNA from an earlier project. “It was actually very late in the record that we got to this,” says Gabriel. There had been a song that musically I’d started, I think, around the OVO project called Pukka. It was very different to this, but it was actually the starting point for coming back to this song. I just felt there was a good groove there, and I wanted something else with rhythm and so we tried a few things when I was working with Brian Eno. The excitement and energy in the song was something that I was getting off on. I felt we didn’t have enough of that for this record.”

The fifth track released, “Four Kinds of Horses,” “actually began on Richard Russell’s project ‘Everything Is Recorded,’ said Gabriel in a May post. “He’s a friend (and founder of XL Records) and he asked me to pop in to his studio. I came up with some chords, melodies and words on top of a groove he was working on. We tried a few things that didn’t altogether work and so it laid dormant for quite a while. Then I started playing around with it again and changed the mood and the groove and something else began to emerge with a better chorus.

When he released the title track on April 6th, he noted, “This month the song is ‘i/o’ and ‘i/o’ means input/output. You see it on the back of a lot of electrical equipment and it just triggered some ideas about the stuff we put in and pull out of ourselves, in physical and non-physical ways,” says Gabriel. The song features Soweto Gospel Choir, who were recorded at High Seas Studios in South Africa.

Of the album, he says, “It’s been around for a long time as a title for this project. I always knew I was going to write a song called “i/o”, 

“‘Playing For Time,’” says Gabriel of the stunning third track, “is a song that I have been working on for a long time and have performed live, without lyrics, so some people may be familiar with it. It’s been an important song for me. It’s about time, mortality and memories and the idea that each of us has a planet full of memories which get stashed inside the brain.

“It is more of a personal song about how you assemble memories and whether we are prisoners of time or whether that is something that can actually free us. I do think it’s good to push yourself towards more bold or interesting experiences because then you will have richer memories to feed you when you get to my age. You also get taught by every meaningful experience that you go through.

Of “The Court,” Gabriel says, he was inspired by the work of Namati, whose mission is to provide people around the world access to justice they may not otherwise be able to afford. “I had this idea for ‘the court will rise’ chorus, so it became a free-form, impressionistic lyric that connected to justice, but there’s a sense of urgency there. A lot of life is a struggle between order and chaos and in some senses the justice or legal system is something that we impose to try and bring some element of order to the chaos. That’s often abused, it’s often unfair and discriminatory but at the same time it’s probably an essential part of a civilized society.” Listen to the song as well as an extended feature on the track. “I’m an old drummer; I still love to find a groove,” he says.

The European dates marked his first shows outside of North America since 2014’s tour celebrating the era-defining album “So”. “It’s been a while and I am now surrounded by a whole lot of new songs and am excited to be taking them out on the road for a spin. Look forward to seeing you out there,” said Gabriel in the original November tour announcement.

Produced by Live Nation, the 22 shows in Europe kicked off on May 18th before wrapping on June 25th. The touring band includes Gabriel veterans Tony Levin (bass), Richard Evans (guitar, flute), Manu Katché (drums), and David Rhodes (guitar), plus newcomers Ayanna Witter-Johnson (cello, piano, vocals), Marina Moore (violin, viola, vocals), Don McLean (keyboards), and Josh Shpak (trumpet, french horn, keys, vocals).

In December, Gabriel previewed the first release, “Panopticom,” and the tour for members of his fan club.

“Panopticom” references an idea that Gabriel has been working on to initiate the creation of an infinitely expandable accessible data globe. The aim is to “allow the world to see itself better and understand more of what’s really going on.”

“I’m lucky to have two of the world’s best mix engineers, Tchad Blake and Mark ‘Spike’ Stent, working with me on the music from “i/o,” Gabriel wrote . “Rather than choosing only one of their mixes to release I have decided that people should be able to hear all the great work that they are both doing.”

Peter Gabriel turned 73 on February 13th.

New York post-punkers Nation Of Language will follow up with a new album, their big breakout, the 2021 sophomore album “A Way Forward”, with their new LP “Strange Disciple” to be released this week. The band has already shared the early tracks “Sole Obsession,” “Weak In Your Light,” “Stumbling Still,” and “Too Much, Enough.” And a few days ago, they also covered Aldous Harding’s “Treasure” live-in-studio for SiriusXM. the band have dropped one last track before the LP arrives.

Nation Of Language’s new song “Sightseer” is a graceful, restrained piece of new wave. Ian Richard Devaney’s voice is swaddled in reverb, and he delivers most of his lyrics in a majestic sigh while a gentle bassline and a gleaming keyboard propel him along. It sounds like something that New Order might make if they were in an uncommonly chill mood. 

Released on: 11th September 2023 through Play It Again Sam

When recording “Sucker”, her fourth LP as Ian Sweet, Jilian Medford broke out of her comfort zone, both as a musician and as a Los Angeles resident feeling stuck in isolation. That liberating feeling takes shape in a catchy, polished sound audible in lead single “Your Spit” (whose music video features cameos by Saturday Night Live cast members Sarah Sherman and Martin Herlihy). “Your Spit,” is a hooky and blown-out rock song with the chorus: “Kiss me like you mean it/ Kiss me like you’re leavin/ Your spit tastes different/ Kiss me like you mean it/ Make me believe it.”

“‘Your Spit’ is about the joy and fear that surrounds new relationships,” Medford said. “The excitement that’s also accompanied by doubt. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say the song is just mostly about making out.”

It was produced by Alex Craig and Strange Ranger’s Isaac Eiger, 

“Sucker” also includes a new rendition of “Fight,” which originally appeared on Medford’s 2022 “Star Stuff” EP, for a little dose of reimagining her past in the present. 

Kristin Hersh’s new album is a cinematic road trip; a series of personal vignettes from a fiercely independent auteur, sitting plush with layers of all- consuming strings and mellotron.

It’s a watershed moment in a career overflowing with creative firsts and inspirational thinking; an elegant piece of personal reportage, a home movie caught in time. Previously, the juxtaposition of light and dark has been essential to the drama of Throwing Muses and 50FOOTWAVE, but this solo set is something of a departure; more inward looking, quieter but outspoken, underpinned by background noise for ambience and awkwardness. “Passion sounds less angry, more grateful, I think,” Kristin muses, “sweeter, sadder. And somehow, no less alive… over car engines and rain in New England and whistling ducks and wind chimes in New Orleans, it all sounds wistful to me.”

“Clear Pond Road” is a life-affirming statement, a further part of the jigsaw, a very personal memoir, from street signs to snapshots; a late blossoming and coming-of-age from a true icon of independence. The record is both intimate yet expansive, written largely within the confines of Hersh’s home, making the proceedings ever more personal.

“Deliciously dark and yet full of an elegant lightness, this is Hersh at the top of her considerable game” ★★★★ Uncut Magazine

“Stunning” The Wire: Adventures In Modern Music

“Personal, passionate and quietly intimate” MOJO

“Simple and propulsive” Stereogum

“Fierce but intimate, pretty but lacerating… it comes with 30 years of rock and roll life behind it.” Aquarium Drunkard

“A wonderful record … Hersh has parlayed subcultural innovations – and sometimes abyssal bleakness – into something with incredible longevity, depth and beauty.” ★★★★★ theartsdesk.com

“Her powers of observation and capacity to live within her art, which combined with her capacity for communicating sincere emotion with her audience, goes a long way to explain Hersh’s enduring appeal.” The Quietus

“A stripped down look into intimate moments of Hersh’s life. It pays homage to all the little pieces that make up the concept of living” Under the Radar

“Resisting convention, it refuses to be pinned down” ★★★★ Slant Magazine

“Beautiful” BrooklynVegan

“A rather quiet affair, a finely arranged album full of bittersweet love songs” Rolling Stone Germany

Kristin Hersh’s new album ‘Clear Pond Road’ is a cinematic road trip; a series of personal vignettes from a fiercely independent auteur, plush with layers of atonal, edgy-dreamy strings and mellotron. It’s a watershed moment in a career overflowing with creative firsts and inspirational thinking, an elegant piece of personal reportage: a home movie caught in time.

CLT DRP have written the album we did not know we needed: completely novel and utterly necessary, “Nothing Clever, Just Feelings” is out today via Venn Records.

The Brighton-based electro punk trio are following up on their incredible debut album, “Without The Eyes”, which was widely loved by musicians and critics because of its sheer originality. This second album is everything we loved about “Without The Eyes”, but expanding into new sounds and with refined instrumentation and production. 

CLT DRP have mastered the art of innovating while maintaining the signature sounds that fans love. Scott Reynolds’ guitar and Daphne Koskeridou’s drums continue to test the boundaries between melody and rhythm, building clanging cacophonies which subside into a wide range of different sounds in a genre-defying blend, and continually building to the next burst of noise. 

The music writhes behind Annie Dorret’s cutting observations of gender and femininity, illustrating widespread societal issues through deeply personal anecdotes. Their wry tone walks the line between anger and resignation, voicing the lived experiences of women and marginalised genders.

The album bursts open with leading single ‘New Boy’: simultaneously vocals, drums and guitar command attention, with the power to break even the weariest of listeners out of a stupor. 

This is followed by the title track: a clanging anthem for cognitive dissonance, inner conflict and overthinking, driven by a drumbeat reminiscent of a beating heart. This is soon joined by Reynolds’ layered, industrial guitar sounds, creating a rhythmic and feverish pulse throughout. This frantic and urgent energy echoes lyrics which traverse the turmoil of trying to impress someone who makes you feel rejected.

Aptly named, ‘I see my body through you’, explores body image against a gothic backdrop of perhaps the most traditional rock guitar we’ve heard from Reynolds in CLT DRP. Accompanied by smooth and melodic vocal delivery, for me this track recalls 2000s nu metal and introduces a softer side to the album which is revisited in later tracks. 

Listeners are then launched into the chaotic noisecape of ‘Desire / 1 on 1’ and ‘M.U.T.M.’ which blend these more traditional rock sounds with classic CLT DRP industrial, thrashing noise punctuated with playful, dancey interludes. These tracks explore intimacy with self and others through defiant, detached descriptions of deeply vulnerable experiences. 

This is then followed by ‘Cake 4 The Women’ which is playful until it’s not, featuring some of the band’s own favourite lyrics from the album: “bruised lungs, high heels”, exploring the aftermath of a night out. 

Next up is ‘Only One’, which despite being less than 4 minutes long has a progressive feeling to it, building epic and atmospheric sounds.

Track 8, ‘Daily Affirmations’, Opening with a noise like an elastic band being stretched too far, the track explores jealousy, toxic positivity, wellbeing culture and friendships, dissected with Dorret’s keen scalpel.

‘The Door’ sets a sinister scene for the final two tracks of the album, drawing the 80s influences of the band out in a soundscape worthy of Netflix’s Stranger Things. ‘Easier Than This’ is one of the most melodic and atmospheric songs from the album; softer and less chaotic. The instruments revert to more traditional roles, before erupting into noise for the final track, ‘I Put My Baby to Sleep’. This song opens with melodic, metallic drums by Koskeridou accompanied by guitar sounds like a deflating balloon, or an electronic toy losing battery power. Truly original, this track is the perfect closing song. The album ends with whirring, glitching guitar sounds trailing out as if the album itself has exhausted its own energy source.

From the lyrical candour to the musical experimentation, this is arguably the most exciting album of 2023. It’s rare to come across something that has never been done before but CLT DRP have achieved it yet again.

“Nothing Clever, Just Feelings”, out now via Venn Records.

Sprints’ debut album “Letter to Self”  embodies their substantial evolution over the past 3 years. Transforming pain into truth, passion into purpose and perseverance into strength, the Dublin four-piece have steadily grown in stature, releasing two acclaimed EPs and building a fearsome live reputation.

The Dublin four-piece announce their daring and diligent debut album. A tour-de-force of garage-punk full of heart and honesty. It’s vulnerable and visceral with its noise and catharsis as the band explore themes of identity, sexuality and catholic guilt.

“Letter to Self” is the sound of Sprints consolidating and levelling up. Exhibiting their most vulnerable moments and imbuing their visceral garage-punk with a palpable sense of catharsis that we can all benefit from.

Inspired by Savages, their sound matured into energetic and abrasive garage-punk, synthesising influences ranging from early Pixies, Bauhaus, Siouxsie Sioux, IDLES and LCD Soundsystem. A dry take on fear, insecurity and imposter syndrome, our new single ‘Up and Comer’.

Singer, guitarist and lead-songwriter Karla Chubb tackles her inner turmoil head-on, and uses her platform to address inequality and issues close to hear heart, like the campaign for ‘Repeal The 8th’, and women’s ongoing fight for bodily autonomy, struggles with self acceptance, identity, mental health struggles, sexuality and catholic guilt. 

For their debut album the band set about transforming so-called “negative energy” into an opportunity for communal catharsis and healing. Karla Chubb explains sums up message that lies at the very heart of the album: “No matter what you’re born into, or have experienced, there’s a way to emerge from this and be happy within yourself.”

“Letter to Self”, out January 5th on City Slang Records.

While perhaps best known as the singer, lyricist, composer, bass player, guitarist and producer for one of the most significant and best-selling bands of the 1970s, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Greg Lake was a highly respected singer-songwriter releasing solo and collaborative material spanning four decades. He was also an incredibly in-demand musician playing with The Who, Ringo Starr and the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Greg Lake ‘Magical’ is a limited edition seven-disc set that brings together Greg’s solo studio and live material for the first time, along with collaborations

A limited edition, seven-disc, 91-track celebration of the music of Greg Lake, “Magical“, is to be released through Manticore Records, via Spirit Of Unicorn Records on November 10th. As well as featuring music from Lake’s earliest years with the likes of The Shame and his work with both King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer, the set features both of Lake’s official solo releases, 1981’s “Greg Lake” and 1983’s “Manoeuvres” and collaborations with Toto, Gary Moore, Asia, Geoff Downes, Keith Emerson, King Crimson, ELP, Emerson, Lake & Powell and many more.

“Magical” also features rare tracks and live recordings such as Greg fronting King Crimson supporting The Rolling Stones at the legendary Hyde Park show in 1968, three previously unheard stracks recorded in the early 80s with Toto, along with songs from his time with Asia, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, The Greg Lake Band, Greg Lake’s Ride The Tiger (with Asia/Yes keyboardist Geoff Downes), Emerson & Lake and one of Greg’s first ever recordings fronting The Shame in 1967.

‘Magical’ features Greg’s two solo albums, including his hard rock-infused debut, featuring Gary Moore. Also included are two live albums, including ‘Songs of A Lifetime’ where Greg covers artists such as The Beatles & Elvis Presley as well as a stunning version of The Impressions/Curtis Mayfield classic ‘People Get Ready’, all of whom inspired him to become such a celebrated songwriter.

This incredible collection of Greg’s career has been curated with his family’s full involvement and blessing, who have opened their archive to allow for the inclusion of rare material. All the audio within the set has been mastered from the best available sources by renowned engineer Andy Pearce. Greg Lake ‘Magical’ is a worthy tribute to a unique talent.

“Magical” is presented in a 10” x 10” box, the limited edition seven-CD set has a 64 page coffee table book featuring extensive notes for each album along with unseen photos from the Lake family archive as well as sleeve notes by Jerry Ewing, Editor of Prog Magazine, who speaks with many of Greg’s collaborators.

Released on MANTICORE RECORDS through SPIRIT OF UNICORN MUSIC on November 10th 2023