Tuesday, December 29, 2020

the name

I've written before about how I came up with a name as stupid as worriedaboutsatan for a band, but weirdly not on this blog, so I thought I'd take a bit of your sweet, precious time, and recollect how a young me thought that using a handle from a message board for a band name would be a cracking idea.

Well, wikipedia is correct when it says it's pinched from a song title - and an obscure one at that - but it's sort of half the 'story' behind it.

Y'see, back in the olden days, there were these things called message boards. You don't get them much anymore, as everyone's on twitter and facebook and all that. Anyway, in the before times, I'd go on the board for one of my favourite bands: Belgium's very own dEUS. I'd been a fan for years, after randomly catching their 1999 opus Instant Street on MTV2. The album that's from btw, The Ideal Crash, is one of my favourite albums of all time, but enough about that.

They'd not done a record in absolutely ages (it'd take 6 between The Ideal Crash and Pocket Revolution), so there was a whole bunch of us just chatting rubbish on these boards, but before I joined up, I needed a name which screamed 'I KNOW THIS BAND BETTER THAN YOU', so I went rifling through my old singles and EPs, and there it was, track 3 from the Theme From Turnpike single: 'Worried About Satan'.


You've no idea how close I came to naming myself, and therefore the band, 'My Little Contessa', but satan moves in mysterious ways eh? The early internet being as it was, you couldn't have spaces without doing underscores, so I rammed all the words together (this fit with the post-rock style of the time too) and became worriedaboutsatan on the dEUS.be forum.

I'd not actually planned on using the name for the band, which was at that point just an off-shoot of my bedroom noodlings, but the forum were putting together a covers CD of old dEUS songs, so I obliged, but couldn't think of anything else to call it. I was in a band at the time anyway, and this was just a bit of fun, so I thought 'ah fuck it' and the first satan track was born.

I'd had some other doodles and college projects lying around too, so I decided to bundle it all together and call it EP1 by worriedaboutsatan. The band I was in eventually split up, so just decided to keep on with the satan stuff and see how far it went.

Anyway, there you go - I hope this clears up that I'm not ultra religious, or a satanist, or anything like that. Just an edgelord kid on the internet who's silly idea stuck for the past 15 years :)

Thursday, December 3, 2020

records of the year 2020

Here you go, have a few albums that I enjoyed from the past 12 months. Some great stuff out this year, but I think I probably spent most of it catching up with older albums, and replacing stuff I lost as my old faithful hard drive died :( anyway, here you go, in no particular order- get yr headphones on:


Charli XCX - How I'm Feeling Now

 

Hayley Williams - Petals For Armor
 

 

Mute Forest - Riderstorm

 

 

Falconetti - A History Of Skyscrapers

 

Zelienople - Hold You Up

 

Nine Inch Nails - Ghosts V: Together


 

Daniel McCagh - Altered States


 

Hooks Arthur - What You Know May...


 

Selena Gomez - Rare (Deluxe edition)


 

KMRU - Saal


 

Leaaves - Moon King


 

FRKL - Excision After Love Collapses


 

Troye Sivan - In A Dream


Mourn - Self Worth

 


Friday, November 27, 2020

satan 2020

As we're rapidly approaching the end of quite a strange year, I thought I'd do a big dispassionate list of all the music under the names worriedaboutsatan & Gavin Miller from the past 12 months (although there's not been too much solo stuff for obvious reasons), just in case you missed something and you want to check it out. It also works as a nice little reminder for me, as I tend to forget these things more often than you'd think.

Releases (all satan unless stated)

Crystalline (album, Sound in Silence) [here]

Rewilding (track as Gavin Miller, taken from a compilation on Whitelabrecs) [here]

Orion (track, taken from a cassette split with Capac, This Is It Forever) [here]

Bradford Telephone Exchange (album as Gavin Miller, Shimmering Moods) [here]

Heart Monitor 10th Anniversary Edition (EP, self released) [here]

Dawn (single, n5MD) [here]

Time Lapse (album, n5MD) [here]

What Are You Looking For? (track, taken from a split with Veins Full Of Static, This Is It Forever) [here]

Lost At Sea (track on Daniel Crompton's 'From Perpetuity' compilation) [here]

The Vault (EP, self-released) [here]

Europa (compilation album, Past Inside The Present) [here]

Nothing Hurts Forever (collaboration album with Glacis as Gavin Miller, Whitelabrecs) [here]

Then For A Long Time, Nothing Happened (track, taken from n5MD's 20th anniversary compilation) [here]

Remixes

VLMV - The Great Escape (self released) [here]

Ghosts - Baekma (self released) [here]

preston.outatime - Semblance, Resemblance (self released) [here]

Pijn - Denial (Holy Roar) [here]

Zakè - Genève (Past Inside The Present) [here]

 



Wednesday, November 18, 2020

gigs, and a lacktherof

Been thinking about gigs a bit recently (for obvious reasons), and after Bandcamp announced they're doing a paid streaming thing coming soon - which I think is a great idea - I thought back over the past 15 years or so of satan to really pick out some gig memories. Then, I thought who the fuck wants to hear those? So I drifted into those times the band canned gigs off.

Now, since 2005(ish), worriedaboutsatan has been a side-project, a one man band, a college project, a full band, a touring monster, a support slot mainstay, a fully fledged festival headliner (citation needed) and headline act. Over the years, the band prided itself on the live side of things - we've done so many (and I mean SO FUCKING MANY) crap gigs over the years, it's a wonder the band still exists. Trips to Nottingham on empty Sunday evenings for the total of £9 (which we even had to haggle upwards off the promoter), Playing a 200 cap venue in Oxford to literally 3 people, a disused missile silo with no roof in East Germany - y'know, that kinda thing. But we never really canned off a gig. Hell, there was once when I was in hospital having to wait for emergency surgery, but the band still fulfilled a gig booking (albeit without me).

However, there were times when even we'd had enough. I thought about those the other day, and as there were surprisingly few examples (which makes us the good guys, right?) they were easy to remember. 

There was the festival in Kent back in 2007, when we'd just started touring and recording stuff. We'd play anywhere at that point, but a sort-of hippy festival in the middle of Kent over a weekend, with camping the only accomodation open to us, with zero fee, was a bit much. I remember reluctantly picking up a tent I'd had in my parents' shed for years, with the intention of sleeping in it that weekend. I took it back to my house, and in front of several people all calling us nuts for agreeing to do this stupid gig, I realised the bag didn't have any tentpoles. The decision was made there and then that we'd made a huge error, and we'd have to pull out. Which we did. Apologies to all Kent based electronica fans. Bit keen, weren't we? There's a difference between gigging around your local town for a surprise tenner in fee, and driving hundreds of miles to play for 30 minutes in a field in Kent. KENT!

There was another cracker I remembered too - Sheffield. We were booked to do a strange electronica festival (think it was more an alldayer) above a pub on a rainy winter Friday night. We got there, cold, tired (we'd come straight from work) and slightly annoyed that our stage time was close to 11pm. As we arrived, we went upsairs with a bit of gear from the car, to be confronted by two things: a massively empty room (naturally), and the promoter asking us if we'd switch stagetimes with another band, who, and I'm not kidding here, wanted to go hiking the next day. What was the stagetime I hear you ask? 2am. Yes, they wanted us to wait around until 2am (think it was about 9pm at this point) to play, as another band wanted to go on early so they could be up for a walk. To be honest, I think they saw how bad the night was going, and just wanted to get out of there. This was another one for zero money, so completely out of character for worriedaboutsatan, we sort of laughed, said no thanks, and just walked off. Drove home, ordered pizza and watched Terminator 2 before going to bed at a reasonable hour.

Halcyon days!

Wednesday, November 4, 2020

Lost in a sea of content

Bit of a weird day isn't it? Feels a bit redundant to be trying to sell music to you all, but I dunno. Have to do something I suppose.

Anyway, as someone pointed out recently, my work rate this year has been a bit crazy, and there've been so so many satan releases that have come and gone over the past 10 or so months. I'll do a big list of everything that's appeared (spoiler alert: yes, that means more is on the way) in 2020, but for now here's a few bits you might have missed over the past few weeks:

VLMV - The Great Escape (worriedaboutsatan remix)


- I did this little remix a while back for the guys in VLMV (formerly Alma), as Pete from the band was in touch about another remix satan lent it's name to that was being featured on their upcoming remix record. I'd never really thought that other one was much to do with satan, or represented the name that well, so I told them I'd do another one for them. So I made this! Pretty good, right?

Glacis & Gavin Miller - Nothing Hurts Forever


- technically not a satan release, but c'mon - it's still me anyway so what does it matter? Anyway, this is a collab album I did with Glacis, which came out last week on the lovely Whitelabrecs label. It was basically me treating Euan's piano sketches that he sent me, then layering up with some guitar, synth, bass and Sophie's violin. This has been in the works for quite a while as it happens, and was actually finished off last summer, so it's nice to finally see it out!

Finally, there's a remix I did which I'm not sure I'm supposed to be talking about, but is online in a few places already so... anyway, go here to have a look at what it is :)


Wednesday, October 28, 2020

satan on 6(music)

Yesterday, as part of Mary Anne Hobbs' metal week on her 6Music show, she played that remix I did of Pijn's 'Denial', which was, obviously, pretty cool. But, to make things even better, she asked me to do a sort of interview thing - which was just me talking into my phone voice recorder about what it's like to remix a metal track, and which she played on air just before the remix went out. Pretty good, right?

You can listen back to the show here (I'm on about 1 hour 16 mins in, right after Goo Goo Muck by The Cramps - an excellent choice I might add) https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000nvnt

Or, if you're short of time/ patience, I cut up my glorious minute-or-so in the limelight for your pleasure:

Oh, and the Pijn remix is here:

I also mentioned a 'post-metal' album I'd just released on my label, which some of you might've twigged is that new Falconetti one I put out a few weeks ago. Very much worth your time, even if you don't like post-metal:


 

Nice one, eh?

Thursday, October 15, 2020

Genève remix

A long time ago - think this was maybe last summer as it goes - Zakè, the man behind the incredible label Past Inside The Present, got in touch and asked if I'd remix a track of his. "Of course!" I said, not really knowing what to do. Zach had said that he was really into the ambient techno side of things at that particular moment, and as the sun was out, I decided to flex my 4/4 chops a little. 

The remix is itself was basically just one stem, a really long sun-scorched drone which lilted and waned as it drifted on. I decided to not do anything to it, but roll with it, adding layers and pushing it forward with some drums. I'd also planned to add some guitar ambience as a nice little bed for it, but as the loop is wavering and fluttering, I could never find the right key for the guitars to sit with it. So, I added them at the end instead, just on their own, as a nice little bookend.

Anyway, so I did it and sent it him, and as usual, forgot all about it. UNTIL NOW! The remix album, of which this is a part of, is out now on PITP, and I'm on there with some amazing artists - Hotel Neon, The Sight Below, Benoît Pioulard and loads of others. 

Here it is, in all it's shimmery glory:

Thursday, October 8, 2020

worriedaboutsatan FC Home Kit - 2020/21

Last year, for a bit of fun, I made up a special worriedaboutsatan football shirt. It was just a silly idea that I ran with, but as a lot of you liked it, I decided to do it again for the 2020-21 season! And to top it off, I did one of those stupidly over-the-top kit reveal videos, complete with daft thumbnail covered in hashtags too:

 

Last season's one will be raffled off for charity very soon too, and I'm going to make that a feature of doing these stupid things every year, so that we can hopefully do some good whilst I indulge my ridiculous ideas :)

Monday, September 28, 2020

Europa!

 It's out now on really lovely transparent ice blue 12" and digital download.

If you're after the vinyl and you're not in the states, please save yourself some delivery cash and head to Juno to pick it up here: https://www.juno.co.uk/products/worriedaboutsatan-europa/785633-01/

Oh, and I did a little interview about the whole thing with Past Inside The Present here.

Anyway, enjoy!


Monday, September 14, 2020

Not-on-Spotify special mix

Every month, I do a spotify playlist called Now Playing. It's a mix of stuff I'm listening to at the moment, or stone cold classics that I also enjoy in some way.

Anyway, sometimes tunes I'd like to add aren't on Spotters, so I thought I'd bang them all together and make a little mix out of them. So, here you go - perfect to get through you a Monday:



Here's the tracklisting, as I hate it when mixes don't include one: 

1. Felix - What I Learned From TV (1st release version)
2. Broadcast - Colour Me In (demo)
3. KMRU - Saal
4. Hotel Neon - Relic 3
5. HTRK - Love Is Distraction (version)
6. Happenstance - Knackered Tabernackle
7. Clickits - Lilophone
8. dEUS - Nine Threads (demo)
9. The Creatures - Prettiest Thing
10. Broadcast - Lights Out (Black Session version)
11. FRKTL - Gestalt Approach
12. Dialect - Sitting In More Than One Chair
13. Radiohead - Lift (Minidisc version)
14. dEUS - Worried About Satan
15. Sonic Youth - Simpsons Theme
16. Andrew DR Abbott - Heaton Wild Woods
17. Harvey Danger - Wrecking Ball
18. Broadcast - Tears In The Typing Pool (demo)

Friday, September 4, 2020

The Vault

 Hi all,

As you might be aware, it’s Bandcamp Friday today - the day where Bandcamp very kindly waives it’s fees, so that bands and artists can make a little bit more cash.

To celebrate this in the past, I’ve done sales ranging from ‘banging up loads of old merch I was saving for tour’, to ‘slamming everything down to a quid’, but for today I thought I’d hit you with something a little more special.

You might’ve heard me going on about The Vault fairly recently, which was a near-mythical folder of tons of unreleased satan stuff, made from 2016-2019. It used to contain about 20 or so tracks, but after 3 years of releases, it’s been whittled down somewhat since then.

Well, I thought what better way to draw a line under the past than to think ‘sod it, I’ll just release what’s left of it’, and what better time than now to do it.

So, here you go - 4 tracks, 30 or so minutes, all lovingly mastered by Kris Ilic (aka Lowering)

The Vault.

Enjoy!


Monday, August 10, 2020

The Arrivals Picture House

There's a thread on the Drowned in Sound boards at the moment, where people share their favourite unique special edition physical packaging they've collected from bands over the years. A few people in there mentioned the special edition of Arrivals, the debut worriedaboutsatan album, released back in May 2009.

Properly took me down memory lane, looking at those again. We sat and made them primarily in the satan front room in Leeds, which (looking back) was a complete tip. Was fun though, here's what it looked like in it's heyday:

Yikes.

Anyway, the packages themselves were quite the things. If memory serves, Sophie bought a massive roll of particularly thick, old school wallpaper from Leeds market, and we cut out rectangles from it, sewed a sheet of what I can only remember as lacey paper type stuff in the middle, then added 2 unique photos, a CD of Arrivals and a CD of Arrivals remixed, and topped it off with a hand typed tracklisting on a piece of cartridge paper. On the reverse, I'd type out a special message, unique to each edition. Here's what someone got on the DiS thread:

I remember that picture. Me and Sophie bought it from a charity shop, as we couldn't stop laughing at the expression the dog's face. Incidentally, it's taken over 10 years for us to realise that Rex Flood isn't the dog's name, but the artist's. I've no idea why we'd assume someone would sign the picture with the dog's name, but the mind works in mysterious ways. We found it online anyway, here he is:

What a dude. No idea what happened to that picture, but apparently could've been worth something, as Mr. Flood is a big deal in the dog sketching world.

The packages though, holy moly. We made 100 of them, and sold them all out eventually. I uploaded all 100 photos to an old tumblr too, so you can see which number yours was, and what else you could've gotten. It's still online here: https://arrivals-blog.tumblr.com/ 

Anyway, was nice to remember all this today. 2009 seems like an absolute lifetime ago now, but was great fun whilst it lasted.

 


Thursday, July 30, 2020

satan x pitp

 Did someone say 'new satan'?

As revealed yesterday, the American label Past Inside The Present has weirdly agreed to put out one of my records :)

They are very, very lovely people, and also really, stupidly good at what they do. I'm really very pumped about all this, so it's with great pleasure that they're putting out a lovely transparent blue vinyl with the worriedaboutsatan name on it.

The record is a bit of a weird one, so I thought I'd explain a little about it. It's called Europa, and it's a sort of a best-of, with two brand new tracks added in there. When I first started talking to Zach at the label, he wanted to put out, as a kind of introduction I suppose, a few older bits of the satan catalogue alongside some new stuff I'd sent him. So I let him pick through the various newer bits of the discography, and he settled on what is now Europa: Shift (part 1), Who Is A Hunter? and Cloaking.

What's weird is that the Who Is A Hunter? / Cloaking single was originally supposed to be released as a 12" single on another label, but it never saw the light of day for some reason. This was in about 2017 if I remember rightly, and after a year of not hearing anything, we decided to just release it ourselves as a digital only thing, so it's nice to see it finally on wax, as originally intended!

The two new ones, Vex and Sunk, were from some old sessions that I occasionally refer to as The Vault™ - basically a big batch of songs we finished up when the band was still a duo, and not just me. The vault started in around late 2016, and ended in mid 2019, just as the band was moving into a solo project. These two tracks aren't that old though, and I think were finished up at the end of 2018.

The rest of The Vault™will no doubt see the light of day at somepoint, although it's nearly all out there now anyway.

SO. There you go - Europa! You can add the 12" to your Juno wishlist now, or just wait for me to bang on about it (which I of course will do, closer to release time)

It's also actually just part 1 of a two part release on the label, so keep your eyes peeled for round two later on in the year...


Thursday, July 9, 2020

2 more walkthroughs

Hi!

I've done two more of those 'in the studio' walkthrough things, this time for Time Lapse track 'A Lost History', and Even Temper opener 'I'm Not Much, But I'm All I Have'.

Both are here, if you'd like to know anything about the making of either. Also open to questions about any of the satan catalogue, so if you have a burning desire to know how I did something or other, please do get in touch.

A Lost History (2020)
 

I'm Not Much, But I'm All I Have (2015) 

The whole playlist, which is up to 5 videos now, is here:
bit.ly/satanyoutube

Monday, June 29, 2020

the future of satan live

When lockdown hit, it took the one gig I'd had booked in, 2 festival slots I had lined up, and an entire tour I was planning for October. I was, understandably, fairly gutted, but also I was kinda nervous about how this one man satan would operate onstage anyway, so I felt a slight bit of relief and a new found enthusiasm to try something else.

I'd been working on a live set for ages, btw. I'd had it more or less nailed as early as last autumn, and after a few trips to practice rooms to try it out, I felt a lot better about the whole thing than I had previously. It was to be about 6/7 songs long, using loops I'd made and put into my iPad's Garageband looper, over which I'd play my guitar and loop that via various pedals, and out through a small practice amp. Anyone who'd seen us play as a duo will know that I used to channel my guitar through an iPad anyway, so it didn't really present much of a change of pace.

But then, lockdown hit and I lost all my gigs, and then I thought this set might not be very good after all that. I thought that, after a decade of gigs with the two of us going for it onstage, this new look live show with me sat down next to a lava lamp, playing songs mainly on guitar and trying my best to loop hastily thrown together wav files via a fucking iPad suddenly didn't look too hot.

I sort of panicked about it, but meanwhile I'd started these ambient guitar livestream things on Instagram. Just me and a guitar, looping stuff and having fun trying things out. I couldn't get the electronic elements together with the guitar stuff to go into the iPad that was recording me, so I (as I usually do in these situations) decided to roll with the punch and limit myself to just guitar. It sounded nice though, and I liked just noodling. Not done stuff like that in a while, so it was nice.

But then I started thinking, 'well what am I going to do then?' I toyed with the idea of just sacking off gigs altogether, and just doing these livestreams, but I do enjoy touring, and playing for people, so I don't want to lose that. I'm currently working on a new live set, somewhere between the beat driven satan of old, and the more ambient, dreamy satan of now. I'm hoping it'll be ok, and you lot won't mind me sat down next to a lava lamp as opposed to throwing myself around onstage.

Anyway, I usually do about an hour on these livestreams, so I decided to split it into two chunks when it came to recording them for youtube. Part 1 has been up for a while, and is here:

 

And over the weekend, I finally managed to get a decent recording of the second half of it, which is now up for you to listen to here:
 

I'm aiming to get the tour back on track for 2021, but will let you know how I get on.

Friday, June 19, 2020

walkthroughs

If you've ever wondered what goes into a worriedaboutsatan track, well wonder no more. I thought it'd be kinda fun to dive into the studio sessions of a few tunes and explain how I put stuff together. Starting with 'Twin' and 'Step Inside', I'm aiming to make this a bit of a regular thing, as I had quite a bit of fun doing them.

Anyway, the series is up on the satan youtube channel here.

Here's the one for Twin. It's only the demo of it, as it was fleshed out and finished elsewhere on a computer I don't have access to, but it's fun enough:

...and here's the one for Step Inside, which is way more thorough, as it wasn't taken anywhere else for anything:
 

Any requests for future tracks? Get in touch and I'll see what I can do...!

Wednesday, June 10, 2020

split no.5

Very happy to announce some more new music from the house-of-satan:

 
It's a split cassette with my guy Veins Full Of Static, out via my own label This Is It Forever, on July 10th.

It's the fifth split in the series, where I ask someone to join me on maxing out the side of a tape by letting your inhibitions down and getting a bit experimental. So for this one, I went for a really long, Burial style fuzzy late night atmospheric rumbler, and VFOS (or Jamie as he's otherwise known) went down the route of plaintive ambient washes, slowly unfurling over some barely-there beats. It's a monster, and I'm really excited to get this out in the world.

It'll be out on lemon coloured cassette (it's bright, trust me), and with each order you'll get an IRL badge, which is the same as the one on the cover there. Pre-order lands next Friday, and full release is on July 10th.

Any press enquiries, hit up adam [at] tailored-communication [dot] com and he'll sort you out.


Monday, June 8, 2020

live recording

Hi all,

Thought I'd take a quiet Sunday to record one of these live sets I've been doing as Insta livestreams, and bang it on youtube. I appreciate some don't have Instagram accounts, or would just like to see something in better quality.

So, here you go:


It's actually the first 'half' of the semi-improvisational live thing I have going on at the moment. I'll record the second half sometime soon. This stuff wasn't part of the live set I was going to tour with btw, it just kind of happened once I started these livestreams. Technical limitations meant I had to just focus on the guitar, and do away with the electronic elements, which was kinda nice as I didn't think slamming loads of beats and synth through an ipad via Instagram would've sounded anywhere approaching good.

Anyway, hope you enjoy it.

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

livestreams

On Monday, as promised, I resurrected the livestream stuff. This time though, Insta let me save it all and pop it on IGTV, which I still don't really know how to use properly... anyway, it's all on there now for you to enjoy whenever you like:




PS. the football shirt I'm wearing there is the limited edition Bohemian FC / Amnesty away shirt. It's ace, and is for an obviously good cause.

Thursday, May 28, 2020

Livestreams

I know it's been a while since I last did a livestream, and it seems apt to mention it on the day the last of my gigs-on-the-horizon finally got canned. After two festival slots also got pulled, the last gig I had in the diary was for one in October, which was supposed to be part of a full UK tour, but I've decided to just bin the whole thing off and look to do it next year instead.

Seems silly to be stressing about that stuff when there's so much serious shit still happening, and the last thing DIY venues need is me piping up in their inbox asking for gigs when a lot are already on the brink.

Anyway, with that in mind, I'll try and do the live instagram streams a bit more regularly, and maybe even record one or two of them and pop them up on the satan youtube channel.

You can follow me on insta here: www.instagram.com/worriedaboutsatan and I'll try and get the word out as much as I can whenever I do these things. I use twitter for that quite a lot, so if you're not following, you can do here: www.twitter.com/teamsatan

Here's a taster of what these livestreams look/ sound like (spoiler: it's just guitar)


Monday, May 11, 2020

Release Day Roundup

On Friday, the seventh worriedaboutsatan album, Time Lapse, was released into the world. It was really nice to see and hear so many people enjoy it, and awesome to finally have these tracks out.

Anyway, as these things tend to do, everything got caught up in a bit of a backlog, as there was just so much going on at once, so I'll attempt to log it all here, mainly for my sake, but I thought it'd be an interesting little stroll around the album regardless.

Prog Magazine reviews the album. Some great quotes in there. My favourite is "four lengthy multi-tiered mood cathedrals built on densely ominous drones" - that's a cracker. Massive thanks to Prog for featuring it too.

I had a chat with Sean at MusicTech Magazine, and told him all about how I make tunes. One here for the musicians amongst you - in this piece I talk about how my cavernous collection of modular synths and drum machines, coupled with my array of high powered mac products enables me to create satan albums. Just kidding, it's actually a riff on how little gear I actually have, but am fine with that.

Here's a really nicely written review of the album from Nothing But Hope And Passion. My favourite bit is "A record to dive in and let go, without any bursting crescendos or epic guitars. Instead a steady pulsation without de- or acceleration, providing a certain calmness and thus creating a mood, somewhere between uncertainty and anxiety". Nice.

Another nice write-up from Birthday Cake For Breakfast here. "Dark, brooding but with large glimpses of hope and beauty, this rings with relevance and comfort"

Drifting Almost Falling also gave it a thumbs up here. "Miller is no rush to get to the various hooks and treats you will come across, instead he revels in using time to build pieces that make their length immaterial... Miller makes time an arbitrary concept and you just don’t feel like you are listening to pieces that go on and on and on."

Also, and this is a big one as I've had loads of questions about it- the album is available from a variety of places. If you live in the UK or Europe, don't feel that you need to spend a bazillion pounds on import shipping from the label Bandcamp just because it's Bandcamp. n5MD have worldwide distro, so if you're after a CD or a 12", and you're not in North America - please, please, check out this list I made of various shops around the globe stocking it: https://blogaboutsatan.blogspot.com/2020/04/pre-orders.html 

Thanks!

Friday, May 1, 2020

Bandcamp day, round 2

As Bandcamp are waiving their artist fees again today, I thought I'd make something of it and offer up some long forgotten/ long lost/ hidden in a warehouse stuff that I was originally planning on selling at the merch desk on an up-coming tour. With that looking increasingly unlikely to happen however, I thought what better time to pop it online than today, when you're all in the mood. I'll sign everything, and also include a snazzy sticker of the worriedaboutsatan FC badge in each package too.

So, here's a big list of all the stuff (satan and my solo stuff too, btw) that I've got up and in the tuck shop:

Arrivals
The 'A 10' mini album from last year to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the album is now available digitally. Also, The jewel case CD edition is back in stock, and I swear this really is the last of them! [buy here]

Heart Monitor
The 'HM 10' alternate take of the title track is now available digitally. [buy here]

I'm Not / The Next Round
The handmade CD edition of the satan comeback single of 2014. [buy here]

Even Temper
The handmade CD edition of the satan comeback album of 2015. [buy here]

Revenant
A handmade promo CD edition of the album, never really 'released', but made for press, etc. [buy here]

Blank Tape
CDs still very much available, and also now the limited edition cassette edition is back in. [buy here]

Crystalline
CDs from Sound In Silence still in stock. [buy here]

3 Days (solo mini album)
Limited cassette now back in. [buy here]

The Haze (solo split EP I did with Umber)
Limited cassette now back in. [buy here]

Shimmer (old solo album)
CD available [buy here]

Bradford Telephone Exchange (latest solo album)
Ltd. ed CDs now in. [buy here]






Wednesday, April 29, 2020

Lockdown Session


Here's a little lockdown session I did for God Is In The TV zine. They very kindly asked me to put something together, as I've been doing these little livestreams on the band Insta the past few weeks. It's three improvisations on guitar, lasting about 12 minutes, but it's a nice little break away from everything else going on at the moment.

Hope you enjoy! And that Villa third shirt from last season still looks the money doesn't it? So good.

Anyway, you can also read the article here:
http://www.godisinthetvzine.co.uk/2020/04/28/lockdown-live-session-8-worriedaboutsatan/

Monday, April 20, 2020

Dawn, album version:

Tuesday, April 7, 2020

dawn edit

Hi everyone.

In about a month, there'll be a new satan album out and about. It's called Time Lapse, and was written pretty quickly over the tail-end of summer last year. It was the first one finished on my own since EP1 back in 2006, so it represents something quite special personally speaking.

Anyway, the music business requires various things, and one of those is edits. Now, whipping down 10+ minutes of eerie, slow churning electronica into something like a 3/4 minute chunk is not an easy thing to do, so when I was asked to do that exact thing, I did what I do best: made way more work for myself. This time, I suggested that instead of having to cut up and speed it up (which is what usually happens when you have to do these things), I'd do another version of it completely.

'Dawn' was the first track to be fully completed for the album, back before I knew Time Lapse was even going to be an album - I started by just making some stuff as a cathartic way of doing something. I chose this one as it has some really nice layers, which I had a lot of fun peering into with my editing hat on. I focused on other bits of the track this time, and took a lot of things out, so it sounds way dreamier than the original. Fun fact: the edit ends the way the original starts, so if you line them up, you'll get a really weird 'mega version' of the track. Or don't, it's up to you.

Anyway, here it is - the 'ambient', or alternative version of Dawn:


Thursday, April 2, 2020

pre-orders

As you might be aware, album number seven - Time Lapse - is coming in May. May 8th to be exact, but you'll be glad to know you can now pre-order the 12" green vinyl edition, and the digipak CD version from various places online. I'll make a list, as n5MD are an American label, so might make more sense to pre-order from a UK record shop if you're based on this side of the pond.

Anyway! Places to pre-order

Americans!
n5MD store
n5MD Bandcamp

UK (and Europe, whilst we're still in it)
Norman Records
Juno Records
Five Rise Records
Resident
Clear Spot (Dutch, so Europeans - maybe go here?)
Deejay.de (also European!)
Boomkat

Japan!
Lohaco
HMV Japan

Wednesday, April 1, 2020

Now Playing April

Happy 1st of the month and all that, not that there's much to be cheery about.

Anyway, one thing that might help lift the gloom is that April's edition of Now Playing is now ready for you. Lots in there this month, so let's kick off with the actual playlist, so you can have a listen:




Decided to go with some very old classics, and some very new good stuff too. That Hayley Williams stuff has been great so far - I do love a bit of Paramore, but also really like this solo stuff she's been putting out. Oh, and yeah I added the HM 10 version of Heart Monitor too, as the EP is now 10 years old, it'd only be right to throw it in there :)

Also in the list is *fairly* new stuff from Cloth and Duck. That Cloth album is just brilliant - one of my recent favourites, and that Duck track is great too - they're from up north too, and from speaking to Evie from the band, she mentioned that she was really into smoky noir reverb Lynch jazz stuff, just like I try and make with my more recent solo output.

Zelienople have a new record out, which is just as expansive and beuatiful as ever (it sounds exactly like this Twin Peaks scene), and an old slab of Radiohead for no other reason than it's just a mint song. B-side from something off Amnesiac wasn't it? Blimey, those were the days!

Then we got my old friends Capac, who have an amazing new album out on Friday (go pre-order it here!), and a solo track from Gareth Liddiard of the Drones from about 5-6 years ago. Was the first thing I'd heard from him, and it's just such a beautiful little song. Really simple, but really evocative.

HooksArthur was on Bandcamp editorial recently about how he made tunes on garageband, and how he's really into old school hip hop like Wu-Tang, so thought I'd include a bit from his ace new album as it's extremely my shit. That Tall Ships song is just massive isn't it? Huge riff. Great band.

Beta Band and Magma next, then. Fucking loooove Magma, and this is one of my favourites of theirs. How you can invent a language and make soulful prog epics that spin out for 13+ minutes of mayhem, and not have it sound utterly shite should be a nightmare, but fuck if Christian Vander doesn't make it sound easy. Oh, and that Beta Band track is ace too - kinda krautrock, in a weird way? A favourite of theirs anyhoo.

Then we end on a 1-2-3 punch of Back To The Grill (fun fact: this was Nas' first appearance on a record), a mad, hypnotic jazz freakout from Hendrix and finally one of my favourite REM songs - the kinda-forgotten-how-good-it-was Near Wild Heaven.

Until next month!
(ps. oh yeah, and don't forget to click like or follow or whatever it is these days on the playlist!)

Friday, March 27, 2020

Heart Monitor

Heart Monitor turns 10 today.

It was a little glitchy electronica thing originally, and had a weird time signature as the organ part stretched over 6 bars and not 4 like it does in the finished version. It was also an instrumental, and went through about 6 or 7 different versions before we settled on the one we released.

Anyway, it missed the boat to be included on Arrivals, the debut satan album, released about 6 months previously, so we hit on the idea to release it as a single. With that came the decision, in lieu of any other material to go with it, that we'd stretch it out and include an intro and an outro as seperate parts of the same big thing. Then we asked our buddies her.eyes.like_static (then comprised of Russell.M.Harmon and Jon Baker) to remix it.

We bundled it all together, and made up some fancy packages, and then that was that! We took it on tour around Europe and sold out fairly quickly I seem to remember. A year later, it was re-issued on lovely blood red vinyl by German label Denovali, and another remix popped up, this time from Greek sound designer and electronica artist Dalot.

A decade on, I decided to do what we did with Arrivals last year, for that album's 10 year birthday: take the stems and make something new out of it. So, earlier this year, I found a zip file of remix stems, and also found old folders still on my laptop with the vocals in, and got to work. 'HM 10' is a more ambient re-imagining of the title track, and also features something that was inexplicably cut out of the original back then: Chantal Acda's vocals. The track already had our old friend and collaborator Gregory Hoepffner as a lead vocalist, but the plan was to have Chantal to act as a more restrained counterpoint to Greg's epic screams. I've no idea why they were left off, as they're really good - her breathy coo is just lovely, listening back, and so perhaps it was a production decision rather than anything else. It's nice to resurrect something that got lost all that time ago though, so here it is: the expanded edition of Heart Monitor, including HM 10:




Friday, March 20, 2020

Happy bandcamp day!

Hi everyone.

In light of Bandcamp's decision to waive their processing fees all day today, to help artists affected by the coronavirus, I thought I'd open up the satan store to as many people as possible by making all EPs and singles pay-what-you-want, and having all albums set at £1.

Of course, you can chip in extra if you like (hint, hint), but if that's not possible - that's fine, just grab whatever you want and spread the word.

If the store is a bit daunting, as I appreciate there's a fuckin' load of stuff on there, then here's a handy guide as to the satan back catalogue:

The post-rock stuff



The lo-fi stuff




The gloomy, dark electronica stuff








The cinematic, reach-for-the-sky stuff










The heartfelt, tender stuff





The oddities (live/ remix/ one-offs)









Monday, March 16, 2020

live woes

I guess you should be used to this kind of thing by now, judging by the volume of people doing it, but yes - my one and only warm up live show of the spring, April's appearance at Fuse Art Space in Bradford, has sadly had to be cancelled due to coronavirus.

I guess I'm lucky, as it wasn't a tour or anything like that, but the two bands I was due to support: Good Weather For An Airstrike and Signal Hill, have had to can a massive multiple city tour, which absolutely sucks.

If you can, go and support both, as they're all super nice guys:




 *hopefully* the tour will be back on later in the year, but there's nothing concrete on that just yet. The new satan live set is sounding good though: quite a mixture of styles, which I hope will go down well. I'll also look into doing some sort of live stream thing, which a lot of bands and artists are doing at the moment.

Until then, stay safe and buy lots of records.

Friday, March 6, 2020

bte

Introducing a new album... say hello to Bradford Telephone Exchange.


Now, I know what you're thinking: fucking hell Gavin, how many albums is this now? Can you slow down a bit?! And I'll answer that by saying - yes, I know things have gone a bit mental, but I assure you there's only like 3 more things out this year. Maybe 4. 5 at a push. Definitely no more than 7. I think.

Joking aside, this one's been in the works for quite a while. In fact, I think I finished it off last spring, and it's sat in the release queue ever since. To be fair to Paul at Shimmering Moods (a label I love very much), he told me that he was quite pushed, but did want to put it out, so I left it with him, and that was kind of that. Big love to him, his label is consistently incredible, and just to be a part of it is absolutely wonderful, and I'm forever grateful that he wanted to take a punt on it!

I wrote and recorded it last year, when the band was still a duo, so this record has a very guitar-based feel, as I didn't want it to impact on satan in anyway. Then the band became just me, and so it gets harder to seperate where one starts and the other ends. I'm hoping this sounds enough like just me, or at least something else than satan, that it won't just be a matter of a knock-off satan record anyway.

Sophie played a bit of violin on there, and it really elevated the tracks into something much nicer I think. Oh, and the Telephone Exchange is a real building too. It's on Sharpe street, just opposide the Media Museum. Here you go, have a look around on google maps.

Anyway, the record is available for pre-order now, and is out in full on Monday! Enjoy.

Monday, March 2, 2020

Now Playing march

It's that time again... March's edition of my ever-popular, monthly playlist Now Playing is up for your enjoyment now:




Some great stuff in there this month - that trippy Andrew Weatherall remix of Emiliana Torrini is especially good, and a fitting tribute to his skills, as he sadly passed away recently. Really enjoying early HTRK too - big fan of their more recent stuff, but that gnarly noise stuff from back in the day is awesome. Ooh, that OCH album is a belter too - just out on Rocket Recordings, it's like all my favourite Kosmische put together. Thought I'd pop in a bit of Russell.M.Harmon too - he's a very good friend of mine from way back, and his EP 'We Are Failed' has been missing off streaming services and digital stores for ages, so I helped him get it back online for him. It's so good! Extended Treefingers is also quite nice - not sure it's extended by much, but it's still nice all the same. Rosalía's mad autotuned flamenco is fucking great too, and that big ol' Deathcab tune plays us out. Good tune though, that - props to them for trying to put a trippy psychedelic thing in the middle of a standard DCFC album anyways.

Thursday, February 27, 2020

arrivals and saints

OK, here's a fun thing for you this afternoon.
Back in 2011, when we were working on what ended up being The Very Last Of The Saints by Ghosting Season, I bobbed a little easter egg in there, and wondered if anyone would ever connect the dots.

Y'see, TVLOTS was supposed to be the second worriedaboutsatan album, but ended up (for various other reasons) being released under a different project name: Ghosting Season. We only did a few more bits with GS after this album, before returning to satan full time anyway.

So when the wavs were all labelled as worriedaboutsatan's TVLOTS, I thought this was a pretty cool way to continue the albums, and connect everything into a little satan micro-world. Here's the last track on Arrivals, which is the title track:


Right at the end of the track, it bitcrushes down into a right old sonic mess and then just disappears.
So, I thought, what better way to connect the two albums together, than to have the first track on the new one start bitcrushed, then get slowly better? As if everything was flowing from one record to the other:



I guess it would've worked a lot better if they were both satan albums, but I guess you can't have everything. Oh, and also - 'Ghost Drift' was supposed to be two tracks: 'Ghost' and 'Drift', but it got left stuck together, whereas 'Lie' and 'Through Your Teeth' from the same album were supposed to be stuck together, and not two seperate tracks. Music, eh?! Mad.

Thursday, February 20, 2020

Time Lapse

Introducing album number seven: Time Lapse.

Yeah yeah, I know what you're all thinking: "fucking hell, *another* album?!" well, yes and get used to it, because the satan train is not slowing down, and erm... I dunno how to end that analogy, but yes - albums galore this year!

Anyway, the record is actually quite a personal one, as it was mostly written in the immediate aftermath of the band becoming just me again. I was in a very reflective mood, and so the album (that very nearly might not've even been made) has a very melancholic feel, but also one that sounds quite big and expansive. It's a return to those longer style tracks that twist and turn a little, as opposed to the little snippets of stuff that made up Crystalline.

There's only one track on there from the archive, which is called Twin. It was recorded when the band was a duo, and was part of quite a hefty chunk of material that is currently still unreleased. I mean, it's not Prince levels of unreleased archival stuff, but it's certainly quite a bit. Anyway, Twin has been kicking around for ages, so I decided to add a little Miller spin to it, and add it to Time Lapse, as it fit the general theme and sound really well. It's also another one you can add to the folder marked 'we tried to get a vocal on it, but it never really happened'. I think there were 3 vocalists attached to it over the years, but it just never happened. Actually kinda prefer it as an instrumental now anyway.

Speaking of themes, the whole thing is sort of about the passing of time, the general malaise of getting older, and coincided very nicely with my obsession with the Milner Field ruins. If you haven't been paying attention to my ramblings over the past year, the ruins are from a big stately home that was built in the late 1800s by the son of a local businessman, that ended up being completely cursed and torn down. There's a bit I wrote about it for Atlas Obscura here. The front cover to the album, and all the press shots were taken in and around the ruins by old pal John Banks - the man behind the Arrivals cover.





Oh, and a massive shout has to go to n5MD for agreeing to put this whole thing out. Mike's been a friend for absolutely ages, and I'm delighted that he was up for releasing the record. I've been a fan of the label since about 2010 or something, when I first bought up all those Dalot albums he put out, so it's seriously awesome to see my name on the website!

More news about pre-orders, tracklistings, formats, etc. coming very very soon as well, but for now here's a little trailer to get you all excited:


Friday, February 14, 2020

orion

Today sees the release of some more brand new worriedaboutsatan music - a special 11 minute or-so track called 'Orion'.

It's a big, long beast of a thing, made with this split in mind. I do these little split cassettes on my label, This Is It Forever, and the thinking behind them is to ask people who I like to share a tape with me, and do whatever you like with it. For some, it means make a few shorter tracks, but for most it means have fun and wild out for once!

So, with Orion, I wanted to take satan and push it to its limit: nasty feedback, soaring post rock guitars, gentle synth, ambient passages - the whole shabang. Stuff like this would never usually get on a satan album, or EP or whatever, so it's nice to just let loose a little and see what happens.

I hope I've made something a little different, but at the same time keeping that satan sound intact.

Anyway, enough waffle - here's the whole thing on the TIIF Bandcamp:


Thursday, February 13, 2020

worriedaboutsatan FC

Had a brainwave the other week, and that was to make up a satan football shirt. I thought the little design made by Cameron Steward (which actually ended up a t-shirt before) looked like a football team crest, and being an avid football fan (and shirt collector) I looked to see if I could make it happen.

Well, a few weeks later I finally got around to ordering it:

Good eh?


Tuesday, February 11, 2020

guitar

One for the guitar nerds here. here's pretty much everything that was used on guitar parts for the whole of the Arrivals album:


Things were a lot simpler back then! For reference, it's:
  • a Marshall Echohead (used to love the backward delay function, but hated the annoying click)
  • Boss DD-3 Digital Delay (still have this somewhere - built to last, these bad boys)
  • Boss DS-1 (didn't really like it in the end, and gave it to a mate to borrow, but never got it back! Think most of the album's distortion is from the Line6 Spider amp - I had to get this pedal when we went to Iceland, as we were borrowing gear whilst over there) 
  • a battered Digitech Digidelay pedal (this was really cool, as it let you loop about 5 seconds of audio, pre-Loop Station. Mainly used it live, but it snuck on the record in bits too)

Monday, February 3, 2020

Now Playing Feb

February's edition of 'Now Playing', the Spotify playlist I rotate each month, is out now. I've added 15 tracks as usual, and as it's a bit of an eclectic bunch this week, I thought I'd break down why I've put each track in there.

First off, get your headphones in and give it a listen:





1. Gang of Four - Paralysed. I wanted to kick this month's off with a little tribute to GO4 guitarist Andy Gill, who sadly passed away at the end of last week. I absolutely love those first two GO4 albums, and Paralysed is such a good, moody opener. It starts 'Solid Gold', their second album. Love the open, creepy atmospherics in it. I've often tried to copy Gill's guitar in certain satan stuff, and especially the live set too. He had a great way of reeling out these super interesting, but really simple guitar lines that give thier songs a sense of urgency, but also space when required. RIP.

2. me - Mirrors. My favourite track off the new record, and it's already in the new live set that I'll be rolling out very soon! Of course I added this in here for a bit of self promo, but it's my list and I'll do what I like with it ;)

3. The Cure - Primary. Never been much of a huge Cure fan. Know a lot about them, and all the singles, etc. but never really gotten into them loads. I had that album 'Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me' and to be honest, left me a little cold. Anyway, I saw this in a charity shop for a quid so thought I'd go for it. Neat little record, and this tune is a right banger.

4. Harry Styles - Sign Of The Times. I know, I know. "Why's this guy in here?!" - well it's a good song, that's why. Reminds me of those big bastard almost-ballad songs David Gilmour always had a hand in when he was still giving stuff to Pink Floyd (before Roger stopped accepting anyone else's songs) - has one of those big lap steel guitar bits in too.

5. Delta Sleep - The Younger Years. Didn't know an awful lot about DS, but Big Scary Monsters (their label) did a PWYW sale over xmas, so picked up a bit of their catalogue. Always love a bit of mathy prog, and this is about as mathy and proggy as you can get.

6. Mute Forst - Dance The Spell Off. Oh man, this album is an absolute must. My friend Ryan from the label Lost Tribe Sound, sent it over to me as he put a few of my solo bits out over the years. It's easily one of the best albums I've heard lately, and has this really beautiful, hazy Talk Talk style sound to it. The album isn't out until April, but go pre-order it now.

7. Modeselektor & TTC - 200007. One thing I like about Modeselektor is just how un-seriously they take themselves. I remember this one being a big hit in the satan household around the time it came out, and it's just ace.

8. The Bug & Riko Dan - Iceman. Cor, fuckin hell - that bass! Great isn't it? Always love The Bug's commitment to insanely deep bass, and natty shuffly rhythms.

9. PNL - La Monde ou Rien. It translates to 'the world is yours'. Can't quite remember where I heard this first, but I saw the video somewhere, and as a fan of brutalism, I enjoyed all the footage of the notorious La Scampia housing estate in Naples. Looks incredibly brutal.

10. Kylie - Still Standing. I've always enjoyed Kylie's more esoteric stuff, and she does a surprising amount on albums over the years. This is a really good little 80s almost-new wave kinda thing from the same album that weird Kraftwerk style song Slow was on. Sounds a bit Scritti Pollitti, which is never a bad thing I suppose.

11. Joy Divison - Digital. I just finished reading JD drummer Stephen Morris' autobiography, and everytime he mentions the band, I always get this bassline stuck in my head. Brilliant bit of cold, jagged misery from their early days.

12. Bang Gang - Something Wrong. Questionable band name aside, this one is from the early 00s from a little known Icelandic electronic project. I remember frequenting a Sigur Rós chatboard and p2p site an absolute age ago, and people would recommend other Icelandic music. This popped up, and loved it - so simple, yet really airy and melancholic. Just the kinda stuff I like.

13. The Prodigy - Everybody In The Place. I think the only reason this popped up again recently is that I keep falling down whosampled.com wormholes and disappearing for hours, listening to samples and breaks and stuff. Think I wanted to know where the "let's go!" bit came from, so just caned all the older Prodigy stuff in one sitting. Great fun.

14. Caroline Polachek - So Hot You're Hurting My Feelings. With 'Pang', she's made one of my favourite albums recently, and this is like her 17th appearance in one of these lists. This is her most poppy song, but it's also just really nice.

15. Marvin Gaye - Inner City Blues. Oh man, everything about this track is just silk. That rhythm section is the tightest, yet loosest thing I've ever heard. Such a groove, yet so languid. Fuck-ing-hell.