Welcome to HeartSongs, our regularly scheduled (probably) look at songs and the people who write them. We spoke to Ashley from Austrian folk horror ritualists, The Devil And The Universe, about their new video for ‘The Church Of The Goat’.

“From very early on it was clear to me that this track could become something else. Something that could combine everything this project is about in one song. Also, something that could get us two steps further if we are lucky. So I couldn’t think of a better title. It’s the gospel according To The Devil & The Universe. “Open up your prayerbook and please be seated, your savior is near!”

It’s a love song to ourselves. This project was always designed to be more than just another band doing some weird music. There is more than meets the eye, or is there? Or is it all a bad joke told in a convincing way? There are certainly laughs though. I can give you that. TDATU became this sort of living organism which is playing with us, or do we play with it? I haven’t figured that out myself yet.

At first, I just had the opening four minutes of the song (the long version) and then it dawned on me, I could go from there and make it a 10min rollercoaster ride and put everything in and make it really, really grand. It became bigger and bigger. I spent several nights getting the balance right. Also, my new fascination with classical music went straight into that track. Especially my love for Gustav Mahler. Of course, the song isn’t as grand as that stuff, it’s not even close, it’s just my interpretation of it and the Spirit of Mahler is definitely inside that tune so to speak. He would properly disagree wholeheartedly though if we could ask him. However, for me it is very clear where the inspiration came from. The new ‘Radio Mix’ is a different beast though and straighter to the point. It’s more pleasing for the dancefloor I guess.

After I spent weeks working on that one I realized something was still missing. I wanted to have some sort of vocal track and searched the internet for samples and stuff but wasn’t pleased with anything. And then it came to my mind a good friend of mine, Christina Lessiak, might be able to provide the kind of vocal I had in mind. Just two days later I had her recording and it was exactly what I was searching for, just perfect. Some twitching here and there and the beast was ready to be unleashed.

Edie Calie and I did the concept for the video (like we did with all other videos before), however, this time we didn’t want to tell a story. From the get-go we knew this should be more like the back projections we use during live shows. Someone mentioned UV-light make up and off we went. It’s filmed at home in the bedroom. No need for a big studio or location this time. Luckily Christina, the singer, did a fantastic performance. We included the goat here and there for good measure, Edie did some fantastic editing, and it was finished. We always work very intuitive though, create on the go, on the spot with the things we have. Very much like with the music itself actually.”

Check out the Goattrance EP here

Welcome to HeartSongs, our regularly scheduled (probably) look at songs and the people who write them. We spoke to Tony Kim from the Californian darkwave band, Dance With The Dead, about his favourite DWTD song.

“ ‘Andromeda’ off of our album, Near Dark. This song almost just wrote itself and led the way of where it was going. Second the track was finished, I knew it had to be played live. 

I’d say ‘Andromeda’ was one of the first tracks we started experimenting/writing to faster BPMs, higher energy and big choruses. Definitely one of my favorite tracks from us and probably one of my favorites to perform live.”

Dance With The Dead return to these shores in April;

Monday 2; London, Underworld

Tuesday 3; Milton Keynes, Craufurd Arms

Wednesday 4; Glasgow, Audio

Sunday 15; Dublin, Voodoo.

In a bid to bring you the experience of the first time you listen to a new album (whether you love or hate it) David J. Lownds shares his thoughts after just one play of a disc that's new to him.

In a way it is true that my mind feels hazy in the early morning, like a mist has yet to rise from it; indeed, the metaphors from Hendrix ‘s ‘Purple Haze’, a song basically about “confusion” after a “spell” has been cast, come to mind. Yet I am also buzzing, despite my tiredness and the physical sensation of ‘muzziness’, buzzing with more than just caffeine, and I’m not talking about narcotics (which I never take). Instead I’m referring to the slightly illness-inducing emotional ride (similar to a rollercoaster with fewer gleeful highpoints) that is the experience of listening to something as cathartic and both real and surreal as this album.

Life, released in 1990 by the Inspiral Carpets, had somehow apparently never crossed my radar until today, when the band raised their head like a monster emerging from a murky river with a violent current to hunt for the the people who just don’t understand, who perhaps don’t care about “how it feels to be lonely”, the primary theme of the album’s third track. That was the first Inspiral Carpets track I listened to today, thinking as I did so,”I’ve finally found something as depressing as Radiohead.”

That statement, that epiphany of sorts, the likes of which I never thought I would say, was not a compliment to the band. Well, it did not seem at first to be one. But actually, this is a later era dominated, in the charts at least, by less subtle but shallower music that does not at the end of the day have as much to convey in general, even in terms of emotions given to, or even inflicted upon, its audience. Therefore, isn’t the fact some music can make us feel something really significant– even if it is pretty horrible—a grand achievement, though not a great guarantor of repeated plays, for the conduit for such feeling? Surely it is better than the relative numbness of generic, processed foods, one which lacks substance.

Even with the above statement about the sad, almost happiness-crushing profundity of ‘This Is How It Feels’ in mind, it should be said that Inspiral Carpets, on Life at least, did not make simply deep music for melancholy philosopher kings to dwell on in their dreams as they are filled with visions of Nietzche conversing with Solomon about the lack of purpose in life. Indeed, much of the music has a punk-like energy to it, as well as giving off a scent of nightmarish-but-beautiful explosions of multiple layers of colour that is more in-step with Pink Floyd or later weird-but-wonderful creators like DJ Shadow, the talisman behind Endtroducing’s collage of samples that was rocking and mellow, blissful and frightening.

Just as there are two ways of dividing up Life’s dispensing of energy amid patches of more forlorn soundscapes, the manner in which the guitar comes to the foreground into the spotlight and then disappears back into the sonic night, full of eerie synths and so forth, is also appealing in enhancing the multifaceted – one may even say darkly kaleidoscopic – nature of the album. Often the guitar does little but by doing so improves the album, since this allows the brilliant basslines to shine. Melodies on guitar are shown to often excel here too, however. Moreover,although sameness is often seen as a bad thing in terms of evaluating a group of songs, I thought the sameness of guitar and bass, not in terms of monotonous repetition but consistency in quality, strengthens this album for a chance.

The things that I really think could have been better are the singing and the lyrics. The singing, while passionate and sometimes angry, is not as multi-textured, with screams, whispers and so forth, as, say, the voice of the star of that great Nineties tonic for the depressed: Kurt Cobain of the grunge movement. Instead of being that appealing, the vocals often become overly dreary – and are not helped by often overly repetitive lyrics -- despite their great backing. Due to their sometimes quite dirge-like quality they recall the vocal track for ‘No Surprises’ by those funeral-invokers-in-chief, Radiohead. That said, there is a great deal to be said about the dream-like states that whispered and obscured words and vocal sounds create sometimes—see also, Kid A by a certain group founded in Oxford -- but such effects do not add up to proper attempts at singing (or screaming musically) .

However, it is clear from the first full listen that Life is a tour-de-force, ironically more about death than vitality. Yet, despite its quite hard going and unforgiving outlook, it still proved that independent music had soul as the industry entered a new decade of challenges, backing its calamitous message of its aching words with musical promise and bristling attitude. This album demonstrates there is far more depth than the surface-level swagger of many elements of Madchester and Britpop that do not deliver as much pain for the listener and, probably as a consequence, end up being less aesthetically satisfying, not because pain is the ideal – it isn’t – but because strong feelings are usually what causes us to return to, think on or be otherwise affected greatly by music. Although it is not an album I would listen to that often, I know it is worth much, but not to the extent of, say, a song cycle deserving a five-star review. Regardless, I hold Life in quite high esteem despite, or perhaps as a result of, that lack of whatever it is that draws one to the repeat button like a moth to a lamp, compelling though the album was, song by song, on first listen overall.  

Welcome to HeartSongs, our regularly scheduled (probably) look at songs and the people who write them. We spoke to Tornoto songwriter, Lavender Child about her recent single ‘Happy Illusions’.

“‘Happy Illusions’ was inspired from a weekend at an outdoor music festival. The environment alone was stunning; lush forests with enchanting art installations throughout the trails. The unsettling ambivalence of the place came from the juxtaposition between the people and the peaceful surroundings. My head spun from the irony both in relationships to nature and each other. I heard so many people say that they loved one another, which conceptually was beautiful, but realistically had me questioning the authenticity of the community.

I sat down with Toronto director Dylan Mitro who understood the song completely and came to me with the video conceptualized, ‘Happy Illusions’ is a song about the experience of love and the human connection to nature and whether that connection can be genuine when under the influence.

‘Happy Illusions’ comes from my upcoming album Reflections which revolves around those moments of self reflection where you ask yourself, how am I contributing to this world? How are my actions influencing the environment and the people around me?”

‘Happy Illusions’ Lyrics

Forest green, its presence weak

Masked by the waves of foreign sounds

Praised by the children with wilted flower crowns

We live the happiest illusions

Beats dropping like the acid on their tongues

Smiles only come with their words in a slur

Love is romanticized when bodies are a blur

We live the happiest illusions

Branches extend, like human hands

The children crack their bones

On the way to their transient thrones

We live the happiest illusions

Do we really feel love for one another

Do we really feel love for earth mother

Do you really show your love ?