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Introducing… Vincent Vocoder Voice
Vincent Vocoder Voice's self-titled debut album is a waking nightmare waiting to consume the UK on 18th November 2013. An experimental exploration of the solitary hell of the individual's psyche, there is a sick and twisted humour to be found in the music. However, those looking for catharsis would do well to look elsewhere - Vincent Vocoder Voice has no answers.
'The Unbearable Heaviness Of Having', a track taking from the album, is available to download now via Soundcloud.
With screeching guitars punctuating lyrics ripped from the depths of a sick mind, the album’s sound is akin to the bastard devil child of Cardiacs and Gang of Four with a hint of The Paper Chase’s dark, twisted melodic turns. There are no safe tracks on this album. Each one will challenge the listener, and not all will come out on the other side unscathed.
The man behind the mask describes his music as the soundtrack to Sartre's existential novel, Nausea. His alter ego developed as a means to hold on to, and explore through music, the taboo thoughts most people censor or twist into a more acceptable light through self-delusion. He wanted to create songs that contained no hope for redemption. The album captures the second of murderous anger at being cut up at the roundabout or being handed a half-full cappuccino. The shortfall of disappointment between the face you just saw in your dream and the face you just woke up to.
Vincent Vocoder Voice is a construct of fevered hypnopompic psychoses and has neither body nor face, choosing symbolic representation through the form of a weeping Pierrot mask. He is not real. But he does exist. He's you. He's everyone.
Vincent Vocoder Voice’s self-titled debut album will be released via Sonic Anhedonic on 18th November 2013.
Watch The Lunchtime Sardine Club’s video for ‘Rumours’!
"...breathtaking." - The 405
Brighton based artist The Luchtime Sardine Club aka Oliver Newton (Yndi Halda / Bermuda Ern / St. Coltrane) recently released his lo-fi, psych-folk debut album Icecapades, via Sonic Anhedonic Recording Co.
The video for album track 'Rumours' went up exclusively on The 405 but is now available to watch via the label's YouTube channel!
Gold Flake Paint hosted an exclusive stream of the album on their website but you can also buy and stream Icecapades from The Lunchtime Sardine Club's Bandcamp page.
If you'd like a little taster though, there are two free tracks available to download now from the ABoF Soundcloud page - 'Rumours' and 'I'm... Jesuschristmaam'.
The album is a collection of short stories, such as the death of a boxer, the sleepy sickness epidemic of the 1920s, the mysterious disappearance of three lighthouse keepers, an old woman's embalming and murderous distortion.
The Lunchtime Sardine Club recently grabbed the attention of Amazing Radio with the first single 'Rumours' and also featured on a Big Scary Monsters best of... compilation earlier this year. With the sound branded as "a happier Elliott Smith circa 1998" by Brighton Noise, The Lunchtime Sardine Club's Icecapades is the perfect concoction of Elliott Smith's storytelling style and Grizzly Bear's lo-fi folk.
The Lunchtime Sardine Club's Icecapades is out now via Sonic Anhedonic Recording Co.
Scary People release ‘Smoke’ EP!
Dundee based alternative rock band, Scary People are delighted to announce the release of their debut EP, Smoke, out now via RedRoom Recordings.
To promote the release the band have offered an exclusive stream of the EP, with the track ‘Dreams of Gold’ available to download. Smoke is the perfect showcase of Scary People’s ability to produce technically superb alternative rock, energetically laden with time changes and bound by glorious hooks reminiscent of the likes of Death From Above 1979.
You can stream the Smoke EP and download 'Dreams of Gold' below or from the the ABoF Soundcloud page.
Scary People were born from the partnership between two tour technicians who had only one week to form a band and rehearse a set before their first gig at a sold out show with fellow Dundee locals, The View. Rising to the task, Dan Forouhar (guitar/vocals) and Scott Anderson (drums) called upon close friends, Steven Anderson (guitar/vocals), Jamie Brown (bass) and Troy Lynch (guitar), to join them to prepare for a show that would immediately gain them an impressive crowd response and, since then, a dedicated following.
The resultant debut EP Scary People have created is one that gives the impression of a band who have been honing and crafting their sound for years. Smoke is an accomplished debut epitomised by tracks like 'Smokescreen' and the aforementioned 'Dreams of Gold' as they set the tone for the EP - grabbing the listener by the throat and overwhelming them with thumping, driven drum beats, soaring guitar passages and heady distorted vocals.
Smoke will be released alongside two special hometown performances, with the EP’s successor already in the early stages of production.
Having recorded and produced, Smoke, independently, Scary People maintain a strict DIY ethic towards all of their creative outlets; including promoting their own shows, directing their own videos and printing their merchandise by hand. The band have since sold out a hometown headline show, supported The Cribs and filled the headline slot at the Inspire stage at this years Doune The Rabbit Hole festival.
Smoke is out to buy now via RedRoom Recordings.
Sinnbus Celebrates 10 Years of Music!
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For the last year, A Badge of Friendship have been working closely with Berlin based label Sinnbus. Their most recent releases in the UK so far have been Me And My Drummer, The/Das, Rue Royale, Jan Roth and UNMAP with all bands appearing across various websites such as The Line of Best Fit, Clash, NME.com, Noisey.com (VICE's music channel), The 405, This Is Fake DIY and Artrocker with support from Amazing Radio, BBC Radio 1 and BBC6 Music.
The label are now about to celebrate their tenth anniversary with a series of shows in Germany in October and November. A YouTube video and Sinnbus sampler are below with the official press release and dates just after. If you'd like more information about the shows or the label, please email info@abadgeoffriendship.com.
You can watch a trailer for the shows via the Sinnbus YouTube channel.
A Sinnbus sampler is also available to stream now via Soundcloud.
More about Sinnbus, the label and the forthcoming shows, taken from the official press release:
Cutting edge Berlin label Sinnbus celebrate their tenth anniversary this year with a series of four evenings of live concerts and parties planned in October and November.
With their roots firmly set in the DIY scene, over the last decade, the label have become an internationally operating business working with the freshest, most diverse and dynamic bands on the scene from Bodi Bill, to Hundreds, Me And My Drummer and even UK artists like Rue Royale. Sinnbus are the ultimate tastemakers with their expansive roster covering sprawling post-rock to brittle indie pop and noise to cool electronica - this last ten years have seen them ride the wave of change in the music industry and they've carved a niche for themselves as one of the best new independent labels of the last decade and their reputation is ever growing.
Now the label look optimistically ahead towards the next chapter and what better place to start than with this series of live concerts and parties with UNMAP, The/Das, Rue Royale and La Boum Fatale already confirmed for the concert tour. More high profile confirmations are yet to be announced and there is, of course, a whole ten more years of brilliant new music to come - that's a promise!
Event // Tickets
01.11.2013 JENA | KASSABLANCA
Event // Tickets
02.11.2013 LEIPZIG
| UT CONNEWITZ
Event // Tickets
07.11.2013 BERLIN | HEIMATHAFEN
Event // Tickets
Introducing… Pincers
Pincers' debut EP Molt is pleasantly unsettling, darkly satirical and bizarre. The EP is released on 18th November 2013 via Volkspark.
Molt takes its name from the process anthropods endure when they shed their exoskeleton, a necessary practice lest they become constricted and die trapped in the shell of their old selves. This is also the function of the EP, songwriting being a necessary process to ensure Pincers can continue to exist.
The music is reminiscent of Nick Cave and Syd Barrett. Macabre yet comical tracks like opener, ‘Death’s Sieve’, describes the archetypical figure of Death reversed, presenting him as a childish transvestite whom rides a rocking horse and prepares die charts under the heaven’s stairs. Pincers has produced a lyrically and musically engaging sound to combine with fascinating video content.
The video for 'A Sociopath To Fame' is available to watch now on YouTube.
The bleak poetry of ‘A Sociopath to Fame’ tells a first person account of a deranged psychopath who locates a victim via a social media site, murders the boy in a strange ritualistic fashion involving an ‘eel clogged oesophagus,’ dumps the body in Shadwell canal and then posts a photo of themselves with the victim onto their ex’s social media profile with the understanding they will soon be famous. Molt isn't for the weak hearted.
The vocals sit sonically between accomplished, melodic guitar playing. Pincers uses a hollow body guitar to utter shimmering notes, plucked and strummed to the beat of the squeaking tremolo arm, warping the sound throughout the release. With samples obtained via iPhone and then edited at home foley artist style, Pincers mutilates sound effects and blends them into the music to provide triggers to flare the listener’s sense memories, the sound of bicycle spokes grating against a toothbrush being just one example. The process and the results are both distinctive, creating an EP that's challenging, vivid, and wildly imaginative.
Molt is due for release on 18th November via Volkspark Records.