Jaga Jazzist announce details of ninth album Pyramid

29 February 2020

Photo: Anthony P Huus

Norwegian iconic octet Jaga Jazzist are back with a new album following 2015’s Starfire. Entitled Pyramid, the new album, unlike the previous one, came to life in just two weeks in a woodland studio in Sweden where they secluded themselves working 12-hour days. “The most important thing is that we didn’t want to over-analyze every musical idea”, explained co-founder and drummer Martin Horntveth. “We wanted to follow the first and original idea and keep the freshness.” Pyramid is also their first self-produced album, which was “hard but felt natural”, as Martin said, “as five of us are producers and make records for a living. The result is an album that feels more collaborative than ever.”

The album arrives on April 24th through Brainfeeder but we can already hear the first sterling taste of it in the form of brand new single ‘Spiral Era’.

Dirty Projectors share brand new song ‘Overlord’

28 February 2020

With tremendous albums and releases behind them, it’s no wonder that we’re always excited to hear new music from Dirty Projectors. The outfit of David Longstreth and co have shared a warmhearted and gorgeous new song, ‘Overlord’, featuring guitarist Maia Friedman on lead vocals. “Tongue-in-cheek ode to surveillance capitalism? Critique of our primal confusion of charisma for actual leadership? Cautionary tale about blind faith in technology? Anti-fascist manifesto?”, asks the press release, adding: “Who knows, but ’Overlord’ feels like a ‘Both Sides Now’ for our brave new Amazon Prime world.”

‘Overlord’ comes with an accompanying video, directed by the band’s own Longstreth. Watch it now.

Hanging Valleys tease upcoming album with new single ‘Sleeping Sound’

27 February 2020

Photo: Max Stanely

Hanging Valleys‘ new album, Behind The Backs Of Houses, is finally out tomorrow through Pedro Y El Lobo. After enticing us with the cinematic and sublime title track, the duo of Thom Byles and Michael Phillips have shared a gentle and otherwordly new single called ‘Sleeping Sound’. Vocalist and lyricist Thom Byles exlained the inspiration behind it:

“The song is about that deep amazing sleep that only arrives after you’ve truly earned it. In an era of desk jobs and screen time it can be impossible to find. A recent mountaineering trip in the lake district reminded me of how human it feels to be using your body all day and how sweet it is to be asleep the second your head hits the pillow.”

Take a listen below.

Watch Rebecca Foon’s new video for ‘Vessels’ feat. Patrick Watson

27 February 2020

With a sublime new album, Waxing Moon, released last week, Rebecca Foon has unveiled a stunning accompanying video for the album track ‘Vessels’, featuring Patrick Watson. The video was directed by Stephanie Weber Biron and the wonderful cellist and composer penned her thoughts about it:

“Stephanie Weber Biron created a beautiful visual tale to “Vessels”, capturing interweaving themes of love, loss, memories, transcendence and how the spirit, imaginative world can feel more real at times than physical reality. Featuring Sasha Korbut and Karine Plantadit, the dancers gracefully get lost in each other and the natural landscape around them, taking us on a beautiful path into an ethereal plane. The narrative is both meditative and otherworldy, leaving you grappling with the interconnection of our past, present and future realities and reflecting on those that have been here and those to come.”

Watch the video below.

Waxing Moon is out now through Constellation and all its royalties will be donated to Pathway To Paris and its “1000 Cities” Green Transition initiative in collaboration with the United Nations.

BIG|BRAVE share new video ahead of UK and European Tour

26 February 2020

Photo: Samantha Marble

Following their critically acclaimed fourth album, A Gaze Among Them, which was released via Southern Lord last year, Montreal trio BIG|BRAVE prepare for an extensive UK and European tour with a new video for standout track ‘This Deafening Verity’. Taking in several dates across April and May, the tour kicks off on April 19th at Roadburn Festival in the Netherlands and includes shows at Electrowerkz in London on April 21st and at Maus Hábitos in Porto on May 2nd.

The band commented on the video:

“The video is made from re-appropriated footage from a hot dog eating competition in the USA. With the video we didn’t want to only investigate the competitive hot dog eating community but rather at all spectacles of this character. Ones where gratuitous displays of abundance are celebrated and worshiped.”

Watch it below and take a look at their live dates here.

Listen to the full performance of Oiseaux-Tempête & Friends at Le Guess Who? 2019

25 February 2020

Photo: Tim van Veen

One of the many extraordinary performances that swept us away at Le Guess Who? last year was that of French outfit Oiseaux-Tempête, playing on Friday November 8th at TivoliVredenburg’s Ronda. Two years on from their first foray into the festival, the duo of multi-instrumentalists Frédéric D. Oberland and Stéphane Pigneul returned to Utrecht with a new album under their belts, Somewhere From Invisible, and an expanded line-up featuring the musicians involved in the album, including longtime collaborators Jean-Michel Pirès (Bruit Noir), Mondkopf and G.W.Sok (The Ex), as well as special guests Jessica Moss (Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band) on electric violin and Radwan Ghazi Moumneh of Jerusalem in My Heart on buzuk and modular synths. Mighty and majestic, powerful and gripping, they stood at a crossroads of light and darkness, deftly traversing a sonic terrain that stands as a powerful testament to the range of emotion they can grasp. Drawing from their improvisational energy and disparate genres from post-rock and free-jazz to Arabic music and electronica, they find compelling beauty underneath the places of turmoil in which their music is anchored. For those unable to experience this poignant and intense performance, or eager to relive it, Le Guess Who? has unveiled the full audio recordings of the Oiseaux-Tempête & Friends’ performance at the festival, recorded and mixed by Marc Broer and Philip ten Brink. Immerse yourself in it.