Facebook Slider

Suuns Announce New EP

  • Published in News

Suuns are back with a new EP, Fiction, set for release October 30 via Joyful Noise Recordings. The band shared lead single ‘Pray’ from the record. Speaking about the new track, Liam O'Neil of Suuns said: "We recorded ‘Pray’ in the heat of the Dallas summer in 2015 with our mate John Congleton. We loved it. It was the best song we recorded for our 2016 album Hold/Still, but it didn't make the cut, probably because we loved it so much and thought we had an even better version of it in us. We subsequently tried to record multiple versions of this song, none of which captured the unhinged energy of this live-off-the-floor performance. Discovering this lost jam and its power felt like a reminder to keep in the moment and to trust ourselves - you just have to keep moving forward".

Suuns are future-oriented. New sounds, new techniques, new ways of thinking; above all, new environments are the lifeblood of the band. Whether in a sweltering studio in Dallas with John Congelton, self-recording in Montreal's storied Breakglass Studio, or playing acoustic instruments at Hotel 2 Tango, the group’s environment has always had an indelible impact on the sound of whatever future Suuns are imagining at the time. And true to form, here on Fiction EP, Suuns are exploring fresh processes as a result of their current surroundings and global circumstances.

On Fiction, new sounds and sonic directions are fashioned out of old. A year-long period of limited resources and contact inspired the band to reflect on the various environments in which they've created music over the years: to comb through their previous sounds and creative approaches, and fuse them together with new ideas, ultimately producing a sort of future/past alchemy. Fiction is as much a project of curation as it is one of creation: sifting, re-imagining, and re-framing, sometimes completely disassembling and then building from the ground up. Each song is a live-off-the-floor recording that was then taken into isolation and re-worked. It's the sound of Suuns regrouping, and then poised, and then driving towards the future, which will also involve a new album set to be released in 2021.

FICTON track list:

1. Look

2. Breathe (Feat. Jerusalem In My Heart)

3. Pray

4. Fiction

5. Death (Feat. Amber Webber)

6. Trouble Every Day

 

 

Read more...

New Kishi Bashi Album Imminent

  • Published in News

Kishi Bashi has announced that his fourth album Omoiyari will be released on May 31via Joyful Noise Recordings (Deerhoof, Tim Kinsella). Channelling the hard-learned lessons of history - and reckoning with the country’s past internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII - the album is an uncompromising musical statement on the turbulent sociopolitical atmosphere of present-day America. The album details arrive alongside the first track to emerge from Omoiyari, ‘Summer Of ’42’, which is streaming now. UK tour dates from Kishi are soon to be announced soon.

Speaking about ‘Summer Of ’42’, which weaves a breath-taking orchestral score over a tale of love and loss, Kishi says; “This is a very important song for me in that it's the finale piece to the symphonic piece I premiered last year. It's a love story set in WWII, about falling in love in an incarceration camp and ultimately losing that love. The significance is that the idea of love, loss, and desire are consistent themes throughout history and help us to empathise with a people in a disconnected past.”

“I was shocked when I saw white supremacy really starting to show its teeth again in America, My parents are immigrants, they came to the United States from Japan post–World War II. As a minority I felt very insecure for the first time in my adult life in this country. I think that was the real trigger for this project.”

Kishi Bashi recognised parallels between the current U.S. administration’s constant talk of walls and bans, and the xenophobic anxieties that led to the forced internment of Japanese-Americans in the months following the attack on Pearl Harbour. So Kishi immersed himself in that period, visiting former prison sites and listening to the stories of survivors, developing musical concepts along the way. The unique creative process will be documented in a companion film, Omoiyari: A Songfilm,  scheduled for release in early 2020.

“I didn’t want this project to be about history, but rather the importance of history, and the lessons we can learn,” Kishi Bashi reflects. “I gravitated toward themes of empathy, compassion, and understanding as a way to overcome fear and intolerance. But I had trouble finding an English title for the piece. Omoiyari is a Japanese word. It doesn't necessarily translate as empathy, but it refers to the idea of creating compassion towards other people by thinking about them. I think the idea of omoiyari is the single biggest thing that can help us overcome aggression and conflict.”

The strong conceptual elements of Omoiyari are driven by Kishi Bashi’s captivating musical score. Stepping away from his past loop-based production model, he’s embraced a more collaborative approach, collaborating for the first time with other musicians, such as Mike Savino (aka Tall Tall Trees) and Nick Ogawa (aka Takenobu). Kishi Bashi’s spectacular trademark violin soundscapes are still an essential component of his sound, but the focus of Omoiyari is centred squarely on its songs. The result is his most potent and poignant collection of music to date.

Omoiyari Tracklisting

1. Penny Rabbit and Summer Bear

2. F Delano

3. Marigolds

4. A Song For You

5. Angeline

6. Summer of ‘42

7. Theme From Jerome (Forgotten Words)

8. A Meal For Leaves

9. Violin Tsunami

10. Annie, Heart Thief of the Sea

 

 

Read more...
Subscribe to this RSS feed