Hen Ogledd Share Video for New Single “Crimson Star”
New Album Free Humans Out September 25
As they continue on their journey to the release of their new album Free Humans on September 25 via Weird World, the cosmic quartet of Hen Ogledd—Richard Dawson, Rhodri Davies, Sally Pilkington and Dawn Bothwell—have shared a brand new single and video, “Crimson Star.” The video, featuring the full band, was directed by Deborah Bower.
Underpinned by the melodic tones of Davies’ electric harp (recorded in Atlantis Studios, where ABBA also recorded in their early days), the kaleidoscopic new track explores space and time travel. As Dawson notes, “‘Crimson Star’ is a gentle, pungent pop song about a retired entertainer looking back on their adventures during the heyday of space tourism.”
“Crimson Star” follows lead single “Trouble,” propelled by percussion and voluptuous synths alongside Bothwell’s unmistakable vocals.
Free Humans is an album of seamless, glorious contradictions: inspired as much by ABBA as the work of 12th century mystic-composer-naturalist-
Tackling themes of love, friendship, Gaia theory, sewers, the nature of time, human stench, and the thrills of wild swimming, it’s remarkable that, given the intense collision of influences and wide-ranging ideas at play, Free Humans somehow coheres into a marvelous whole.
Free Humans doesn’t shy away from the fact humans are killing the earth, but it does so with spiky wit. In their hands, Hen Ogledd manages to hold the tragedy of the wrongs happening in the world, as well as a sense of hope and liberation, at the same time.
Free Humans will be available on CD, standard and deluxe LP, limited edition Domino Mart LP with exclusive poster and digitally.
Pre-order Free Humans:
Limited Edition LP | CD | Digital
Free Humans Tracklist
1. Farewell
2. Trouble
3. Earworm
4. Crimson Star
5. Kebran Gospel Gossip
6. Remains
7. Paul is 9ft Tall (Marsh Gas)
8. Space Golf
9. Time Party
10. The Loch Ness Monster’s Song
11. Flickering Lights
12. Bwganod
13. Feral
14. Skinny Dippers
Hen Ogledd Online:
Website | Twitter | Instagram
Hot Chip Announce Late Night Tales Mix
Out October 2nd Featuring Four New Hot Chip Recordings
Late Night Tales is pleased to announce its latest installment to its long-running artist-curated mix series, this time curated by UK electronic artpop outfit Hot Chip. A unique, personal collection that is both euphoric and melancholic, Hot Chip provide the perfect antidote to these strange and uncertain times. Along with featuring new music from the band, they have selected music from some of the most engaging artists of the 21st century, taking in pulsating electronic rhythms, hypnotic grooves and leftfield ambience. Today, in conjunction with the announcement, Hot Chip present their ethereal cover of The Velvet Underground’s “Candy Says,” through which they add an element of displacement and detachment.
Listen to Hot Chip Cover The Velvet Underground’s “Candy Says”
Spearheaded by founders Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard, Hot Chip are one of the UK’s most interesting and much-loved acts. Since releasing their debut album Coming On Strong in 2004, they have received a Grammy Award nomination (Ready for the Floor) and Mercury Prize nomination (The Warning) and their seventh studio album, last year’s acclaimed A Bath Full of Ecstasy.
“I think we all had slightly different understandings of what a Late Night Tales compilation might consist of; varying interpretations of the brief,” says Taylor. “For some the mix might be what you’d want to listen to as your late night continues, after a night out. For others maybe it suggested a selection of music for listening to as you drift off to sleep; then again it could just be music evocative of night time, or concerned with its traditionally ‘darker’ moods.”
Hot Chip’s Late Night Tales opens with the simplistic beauty of Christina Vantzou’s “At Dawn,” before morphing in to the first of four exclusive tracks from the band – the floating, transcendent “Nothing’s Changed,” before Rhythm & Sound ft. Cornell Campbell serve up the heavy dub classic, “King In My Empire.”
The journey continues with Pale Blue’s “Have You Passed Through This Night,” a silky, cold wave disco track, while Suzanne Kraft’s “Femme Cosmic” and Fever Ray’s “To The Moon and Back” provide squelchy synth-pop. Furthermore, the punchy “Much To Touch” from Bolton-born, Berlin based producer Planningtorock. Elsewhere, other highlights include an appearance from synth-pop auteur Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith with “Who I Am & Why I Am Where” and new material from Alexis’ ‘other’ band, the improv-mavens About Group, along with the adventurous “Workaround Two” from electronic experimentalist Beatrice Dillon and German composer, Nils Frahm’s beautifully evocative “Ode.” But it is left to Alexis’ father to have the final word, with an elegant excerpt from the daring “Finnegans Wake” by James Joyce.
“We’ve put together a mix of music which ties all of these ideas together and represents some of our favourite music new and old, some of it directly influential on Hot Chip and some of it music we have discovered and loved, been surprised by and connected to,” explains Taylor. “There are three new songs of ours which we’re really proud of, and which I think connect naturally with the nocturnal world the compilation speaks of, and a cover of ‘Candy Says’ which is one of the first songs the very early version of Hot Chip played when we were still at school.”
The Late Night Tales series was established back in 2001 with Fila Brazilia taking to the controls and mixing up the first of what would continue to be the first choice of music connoisseurs worldwide. Since then, the series has seen releases from the likes of The Flaming Lips, Floating Points, David Holmes, Bonobo, Jon Hopkins, Röyksopp and many more.
Pre-order Hot Chip’s Late Night Tales Compilation
Hot Chip’s Late Night Tales Compilation Tracklist
1. Christina Vantzou – “At Dawn”
2. Hot Chip – “Nothing’s Changed” (Exclusive track)
3. Rhythm & Sound ft. Cornell Campbell – “King In My Empire”
4. Pale Blue – “Have You Passed Through This Night”
5. Suzanne Kraft – “Femme Cosmic”
6. Fever Ray – “To The Moon And Back”
7. PlanningToRock – “Much To Touch”
8. Charlotte Adigery – “1,618”
9. Mike Salta – “Hey Moloko”
10. Matthew Bourne – “Somewhere I Have Never Travelled”
11. Hot Chip – “Candy Says” (Velvet Underground cover version – Exclusive track)
12. Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – “Who I Am & Why I Am Where”
13. About Group – “The Long Miles”
14. Beatrice Dillon –”Workaround Two”
15. Hot Chip – “Worlds Within Worlds” (Exclusive track)
16. Daniel Blumberg – “The Bomb”
17. Nils Frahm – “Ode”
18. Hot Chip – “None Of These Things” (Exclusive track)
19. Neil Taylor – “Finnegans Wake” excerpt (Exclusive track)
Hot Chip online:
hot-chip.co.uk
facebook.com/hotchip
instagram.com/hot.chip
Late Night Tales online:
latenighttales.co.uk
facebook.com/latenighttales1
twitter.com/LateNightTales
instagram.com/
Badge Époque Ensemble Announce Self Help,
New Album Out November 20th on Telephone Explosion Records
Photo credit: Colin Medley Meg RemyToronto’s Badge Époque Ensemble announce sophomore album Self Help out November 20th on Telephone Explosion Records. Recorded live in the months before lockdown, Self Help is an exploratory record that dances across time and genre, guided by fidgety miniatures and jazz inflected collage. While constructed from the inspiration of soul, funk and film music, BÉE mediate those influences having first digested them through the productions of Madlib and the RZA. Throughout, the band pool together their instrumental chops, moving from fluid and serpentine R&B to meditative, minimalistic piano, evoking a contrast of virtuosity and self-surrender.
Led by Maximilian Turnbull (who previously released music as Slim Twig) on Rhodes, clavinet, and synthesizers, Badge Époque Ensemble is now a seven-piece, comprised of Toronto musicians, many known for their work with U.S. Girls and Andy Shauf. The newest member, saxophonist Karen Ng (Feist, Do Make Say Think), joins Chris Bezant (guitar), Giosuè Rosati (bass), Ed Squires (conga, percussion), Jay Anderson (drums), and Alia O’Brien (flute). They recorded at Toronto’s Palace Sound Studio over three weekends, building Self Help’s songs from Turnbull’s drafts. Contributing guest vocalists include Meg Remy (U.S. Girls), Dorothea Paas, James Baley, and Jennifer Castle.
The resulting Self Help fuses jazz-funk and spiritual contemplation, which musically manifests as arresting hooks in sideways song forms; echoes of Gainsbourg spooled through Azymuth-style Brazilian grooves punctuated by the whip and snap of Steely Dan. It’s lyrics search beyond cliché and intellect in a desire to invoke a borderless consciousness. On lead single “Sing a Silent Gospel,” Remy brings serenity to antic melodies as she conjures a conflicted mysticism cooing “nigh must be my lofted peak / or else a sacred landfill.” Lyricist Turnbull expands: “‘Sing A Silent Gospel’ expresses a paradox I have felt while making this album. While the habitability of the world disintegrates, I sense the spiritual realm calmly persists. The world moves through a cycle of apocalypses and it is up to us each to find this movement either meaningful or banal.”
Self Help swerves left at phantom intersections. Rhythms cut loose and tie you in knots. But wired into each song is a sense of gentle accumulation, making every featherlight flourish weigh a ton.
Self Help Tracklist
1. Sing A Silent Gospel
2. Unity (It’s Up To You)
3. Cloud
4. The Sound Where My Head Was
5. Just Space For Light
6. Birds Fly Through Ancient Ruins
7. Extinct Commune