Night Shapes x Hip to Death
Oakland’s Night Shapes along with Atlanta’s Hip to Death proudly present the culmination of four-plus years years in the making with the world premiere listen to their East Coast/West Coast split from Wiener Records. Banding beneath the banner & belief of dissonance that blended analog components with digital advances, the bond between the groups can be traced backed to the mid-oughts. The songs featured on the Wiener split were informed from anecdotes about real friends, wild shows, and a desire to conjure together a sound that adhered to the rudimentary basics of the noise they all grew up with.
Side-a of the split begins with Hip To Death getting the party started with the rocky ridge of boat splintering stones heard on the abrasive & acerbic basher, “Reefs”. HTD’s own John Breedlove & Kasey Breedlove waste no time and bring out any and every big chord they can conjure up to create a shipwreck scale cataclysm. The following single “Forward Progress” samples what appears to be skate videos and the refrain of “I can’t take it” that illustrates progression and forward thinking motions as being something akin to the most chaotic mosh pit imaginable. The sound-speed tempo & visceral resonance of violent distortion creates the a kind of barely controllable chaos of a crowd at a DIY show that gets wildly out of hand. Side-b of the East Coast / West Coast split features Night Shapes bringing about wind tunnels of dream-weaving guitars as heard on “Listen” that invites all with ears to do just that. An interlude of atmospheric sounds ushers the listeners over to the next NS song “No Whats Real” that brings about a “Kill Surf City” style attitude that the Reid brothers would most likely approve of. Night Shapes bridge their melodic elements with haunted & hollow effects where the band’s Jim Morose, Jose Davila, Brian Draper & Brian Figueroa create atmospheric airs as a canvas for their ambitious, howling sound.
Hip to Death shared the following words on how their split with Night Shapes came about:
Hip to Death met Night Shapes back in 2011 in Atlanta where we played a gig with them at 529 club. When Night Shapes took the stage I was instantly blown away. I knew at that moment that I had found and heard something special. This was the start to our ongoing friendship. Over the years we bonded over music, art, and ambient noise which fueled our ongoing relationships. We played shows in the Southeast and followed each other digitally on the close. The last show we played with Night Shapes was 4 years ago in Atlanta at The Basement before their California move. The band crashed with my wife and I that night, we partied heavy until the sun came up and decided we needed to do a split.
The bands’ Weiner Records split is available via both Hip to Death & Night Shapes‘ Bandcamps.
Dizzyride
DIY pop stars Zoë Kiefl & Nicola Donà recently released their Lend Me Your Ears EP through We Were Never Being Boring collective, presenting a barrage of b-sides, bonus cuts, outtakes & other items of interest taken off their forthcoming debut album available January, 2017. The collaboration between Zoë from Montreal and Nicola known for his work in Venice as Horrible Present bring together their shared musical interests that connect from across the Atlantic that blend internationally inspired influences that fuse together as newfound fascinations.
Lend Me Your Ears begins with Zoë’s voice singing over a drum machine & minimalist synth arrangement on the sweetly soothing “Death Of A Slow Song” that Alan Vega surely is looking upon with favor from the great beyond. Nicola & Zoë turn up electro percussive textures with deeper pronounced beats that dot the Kiefl’s ghostly vocals that emerge in & out of a stream of glittering bell synthesizers and flute-noted key presets. The swing softly & dearly style that Dizzyride masters with their sound-brushes of euphoria is heard on the gently swaying archery bow-bouts on “Arrows”, that lead to “Taraxacum” that features Nicola on lead vocals that emulates a throwback adult-contemporary pop gem that leads to the pagan like gates of the reprise of “Arrows” that simulate one last battle at the gates to keep you anticipating Dizzyride’s debut album arriving at the beginning of next year.
The EP began forming during a summer tour, Dizzyride’s Donà and Kiefl provided us with the following words about their EP’s origins from their summer tour, being composed with any & all instruments that they happened to have stumbled upon. Collaborating via tapes and iPhone voice memos that were originally united upon the duo setting up shop in NYC. The two described the stories behind their psychedelic elements & more with the following introduction:
Nuances. Influences.
We let the good Italian stuff surround our minds. Giorgio Moroder, Ennio Morricone, Franco Battiato & Franco Falsini.
We bought and/or found many records belonging to the Disco era.
On our first tour we met a lot of interesting people. They made us listen to bands who reminded them of us. This band from Belgium, Antena entered our veins and stuck with us.
We named our first baby girl after Fela. Of course all the African music inspired us. The 70s in Nigeria were the main drag to start the project. Slowly we traveled North with our minds and discover tons of old time eclectic artists from North Africa. Tunisian, Moroccan, Ethiopian music. We kept going until we reached the Middle East all the way to India through the beauty of Vietnamese and Cambodian female singers.
We fell in love with a bunch of Japanese weirdos and back to New York and the mystery around the East Village and Lower East Side from back in the day.
Before getting back we went for little imaginary trips to the Caribbean and Hawaii where we let the pulsating beats warm our blood.
We feel lucky we live down in Flatbush, Brooklyn where all the ethnicities live together and exchange thoughts and rhythms.
This without counting the rich who are trying to put each other against so they can take over.
We believe in magic. You can’t buy magic. Or majesty.
Dizzyride’s Lend Me Your Ears EP is available now from We Were Never Being Boring collective, with their debut album slated for release in early January, 2017.
