Category: Edge Radio Recommended

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: Drahla - 'Useless Coordinates'

20/5/2019

Leeds-formed three-piece Drahla have released their highly-anticipated debut album Useless Coordinates via Captured Tracks/Remote Control Records.

The album was recorded in Yorkshire in the second half of 2018, and sees the band’s sound continue to evolve with the addition of saxophonist Chris Duffin across the record. Since finishing Useless Coordinates the band have spent their time touring the US and Europe, including stops at Eurosonic and La Route Du Rock this winter.

Blending wiry, dark post-punk with unpredictable art-rock, Drahla have established themselves as a formidable and distinctive band across their three sold out 7” singles and 2017's Third Article EP. Formed in late 2015, Drahla quickly found their identity in Yorkshire’s fertile music scene with their minimal yet robust bass-heavy sound. Their reputation as a fervent live act is ever-growing, with the band being asked to share stages with the likes of Parquet Courts, METZ, Ought, Buzzcocks, The Cribs and multiple festival appearances - including Meltdown at the request of The Cure’s Robert Smith.

Release: May 3rd, 2019, Captured Tracks/Remote Control
Words: Captured Tracks

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: Holly Herndon - 'PROTO'

13/5/2019

Holly Herndon's third full-length album PROTO isn’t about A.I., but much of it was created in collaboration with her own A.I. ‘baby’, Spawn. PROTO makes reference to what Herndon refers to as the protocol era, where rapidly surfacing ideological battles over the future of A.I. protocols, centralised and decentralised internet protocols, and personal and political protocols compel us to ask ourselves who we are, what we are, what we stand for, and what we are heading towards.

For the album, Herndon assembled a contemporary ensemble of vocalists, developers, and an inhuman intelligence housed in a DIY souped-up gaming PC to create a record that encompasses live vocal processing and timeless folk singing, and places an emphasis on alien song craft and new forms of communion.

Since her arrival in 2012, Herndon has successfully mined the edges of electronic and avant-garde pop and emerged with a dynamic and disruptive canon of her own, all while studying for her soon-to-be-completed PhD at Stanford University, researching machine learning and music. Her LP Platform closed out 2015 by gracing year-end lists from Pitchfork, The Guardian, NME, and The Wire. In the aftermath, Radiohead hand-picked her to open up their European tour.

Release: 4AD/Remote Control, May 10th, 2019
Words: 4AD

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: FERLA - 'It's Personal'

6/5/2019

They dug deep. They bled. They wept. They got to work. Now Melbourne’s after-dark pop darlings FERLA have released their long-awaited debut album.

It’s titled It’s Personal, because it’s personal. FERLA’s debut album, recorded at 400 Acres by Rohan Sforcina (Dune Rats, Gold Class, Oh Mercy), is an extension of their creative output thus far. Full of the lush synth-warble and pop pathos for which the band are known,, It’s Personal condenses a tumultuous year of Giuliano Ferla’s life into 50 minutes of music and lyrics.

“It’s like when you make grappa,” says Giuliano, “you get all the leftovers from making the wine; the skins, the seeds, the twigs, all the rubbish; and then you squeeze. You extract every last little morsel of flavour. You wring and you wrench and you screw to the last drop. And what comes out? The purest of the pure. A year distilled. That’s what this album is.” FERLA are offering you a glass of confessional pop. Drink up.

Release: April 9th, 2019, Independent

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: Weyes Blood - 'Titanic Rising'

29/4/2019

The phantom zone, the parallax, the upside down—there is a rich cultural history of exploring in-between places. Through her latest, Titanic Rising, Weyes Blood (a.k.a. Natalie Mering) has, too, designed her own universe to soulfully navigate life’s mysteries. Maneuvering through a space-time continuum, she intriguingly plays the role of melodic, sometimes melancholic, anthropologist.

Tellingly, Mering classifies Titanic Rising as the Kinks meet WWII or Bob Seger meets Enya. The latter captures the album’s willful expansiveness (“You can tell there’s not a guy pulling the strings in Enya’s studio,” she notes, admiringly). The former relays her imperative to connect with listeners. “The clarity of Bob Seger is unmistakable. I’m a big fan of conversational songwriting,” she adds. “I just try to do that in a way that uses abstract imagery as well.”

“An album is like a Rubik’s Cube,” she says. “Sometimes you get all the dimensions—the lyrics, the melody, the production—to line up. I try to be futuristic and ancient at once, which is a difficult alchemy. It’s taken a lot of different tries to get it right.” As concept-album as it may sound, it’s also a devoted exercise in realism, albeit occasionally magical.

Titanic Rising, written and recorded during the first half of 2018, is the culmination of three albums and years of touring: stronger chops and ballsier decisions. It’s an achievement in transcendent vocals and levitating arrangements—one she could reach only by flying under the radar for so many years. “I used to want to belong,” says the L.A. based musician. “I realized I had to forge my own path. Nobody was going to do that for me. That was liberating. I became a Joan of Arc solo musician.”

But Weyes Blood isn’t one to stew. Her observations play out in an ethereal saunter: far more meditative than cynical. “I experience reality on a slower, more hypnotic level,” she says. “I’m a more contemplative kind of writer.” To Mering, listening and thinking are concurrent experiences. “There are complicated influences mixed in with more relatable nostalgic melodies,” she says. “In my mind my music feels so big, a true production. I’m not a huge, popular artist, but I feel like one when I’m in the studio. But it’s never taking away from the music. I’m just making a bigger space for myself.”

Release: April 5th, 2019, Sub Pop
Words: Sub Pop

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: Ride the Tiger - 'Coastlines'

22/4/2019

Tasmanian punk rock elders Ride the Tiger have released their debut album, Coastlines, their first body of work since the band's 2014 EP Partystarter.

Formed in 2010, Ride the Tiger were swift in marking the scene with bright, progressive melodies and claw sharp guitar work. Their sound was set down on two short-form releases (Ambush in 2010 & Partystarter in 2014) and stropped on the nations club stages. Now, armed a debut LP, the scene has been set for a big year and a fierce reminder of who Ride the Tiger are.

Six years in the making, Coastlines was recorded, mixed & mastered between 2012 - 2018.

On this album, Ride the Tiger are:
Lucas Walker: Guitars, Vocals
Lincoln Le Fevre: Guitars, Vocals
Jordan Hooper: Guitars
Nic White: Bass, Vocals
Jason Mizzen: Drums, Percussion

Release: April 5th, 2019, Independent

EDGE RADIO RECOMMENDED: Good Morning - 'The Option'

15/4/2019

Good Morning is Stefan Blair and Liam Parsons, two high school friends who grew up in the outer suburbs of Melbourne and slowly began to spend their weekends tinkering away in a home studio, experimenting with songwriting and recording techniques, slowly perfecting their craft behind closed doors.

After releasing their almost infamous debut Shawcross recordings online, followed quickly by the sophomore Glory, the band went on put together the Good Morning live band and tour relentlessly around Australia, the UK and Europe.

2018 saw them release Prize//Reward on beloved Australian label Bedroom Suck Records. In 2019, they're back with new album The Option, which once again showcases the band’s knack for songwriting; their simple ability to tug on the listener’s heartstrings and make them stop dead in their tracks, wondering about someone they haven’t spoken to in a while or a lover they left behind.

For this record, Good Morning is Stefan Blair, John Considine, James Macleod & Liam Parsons.

Release: April 5th, 2019, Independent

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