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 27, 2020
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)
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.
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.
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.
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.
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:
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:
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