Five Favourites: The Inspirations Behind Grawl!x’s ‘PEEPS’

Having previously received acclaim for their previous three albums, including last year’s Appendix, Derby-based Grawl!x, is now set to release their brand new album later this week.

To celebrate the release of their new album, Grawl!x will be playing our gig at The Finsbury this Friday, and we cannot wait to be captivated by their soaring cinematic soundscapes live. 

Hi there! My name is Maria & I’m in Grawl!x. We’ve got an album coming out called PEEPS. It’s about friends & how important they are in the face of impending doom, but it’s also fun – YAY!!! Here’s five tracks that influenced the making of this record.

Jon Hopkins – ‘Immunity’ 
A big impetus for this album was a trip I took a few years back with a friend a mine. We went and stayed over in North Wales for a night & just sortof hung out. On the way back we stopped by this beach which, given a spot of gorge weather, felt briefly like the hazy Mediterranean. I sat and had a ponder while my friend played with her dog. It was a lovely moment as I’d been having some mental problems and I just felt everything would be OK, despite all this doom & gloom in me bonce. On the way there, we listened to Immunity and the title track is my fave. It was such a eureka moment the first time I heard this; it was like “oh, dance music can be heart breaking, tender & beautiful in an almost classical sense”. Having just done a rather slow piano record, it seemed like a logical progression to pop a beat in there somewhere. He’s rate clever.

Deerful – ‘N1c’
Not sure how I got turned onto Deerful (probs through Haiku Salut who are lovely peeps!), but I absolutely love her voice and synth work. There’s so many from her first record Peaches I could pick but I just heart the vibe in this one. I gather she uses algorithms which blows my mind, but then I am a country bumpkin! Plus, it references The Postal Service, which is like one of my favourite albums ever. It was such an honour to have her sing on two of the tracks for PEEPS. We’ve still yet to meet, so it’s like my first online friendship if that’s rate to say? I remember getting the stems back one shift at work (I’m a projectionist), and I was just geeking out diving around in the dark projection booth. Proper highlight. So, thank you for that Deerful.

Yves Tumor – ‘Limerence’
This is such a beautiful track, and that it comes from such an enigmatic, challenging artist makes it all the more beautiful. It’s just one of those tracks that just makes me yearn for bygone folks & memories of loveliness. When the vocal sample comes in, it’s so unexpected but so playful; juvenile but perfectly encapsulates that sense of youth. It evokes a lot it me face brain.

Emma Kupa – ‘Katie NYC’
This is just one of my fave friend songs. When I was looking at songs about friendship, the most common tendency tended to be that they were a bit – dare I say – cheesy. This is a stark example to the contrary. It’s just so sad and heartfelt. You’re proper there with her and her loved one who’s suffering. I think we’ve all been there where you want to help some one, and you feel so helpless. Of course, sometimes just being present is enough. I might be reading into it too much. I just love Emma’s solo music & proper hope to hear some new stuff soon.

Animal Collective  – ‘My Girls’
I couldn’t not include this song for many reasons. It’s been such a huge influence on my life. If I could ever write a song halfway as good as this, I’d be happy. I’d been in mostly rock bands up to the point this came out, and it just reconnected me to the joy of electronic instrumentation. It’s catchy, beautiful, clever – it’s just so good, I’m listening to it again now! As well as all that, it’s been there in my life at such crucial points. I remember driving with my Dad one time going to the beach in my twenties, and just had a lovely day. I played it at a DJ night recently, and we all had a good grind. Plus, pretty sure me and my friend played it on the way back from that trip to North Wales. Friends are proper important, I think, but friends with music is like the best cake you can ever go swimming in. Quote for the ages I think you’ll agree.

Huge thanks to Grawl!x for sharing their five choices with us! 

PEEPS, the upcoming album from Grawl!x, is out on Friday 14th February via Reckless Yes. Pre-order on Bandcamp now. And catch them live to celebrate at our gig at The Finsbury that night, along with Piney Gir, Captain Handsome and I Am HER.

 

Photo Credit: Laura Mi

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ALBUM: Katie Gately – ‘Loom’

Both a piercing cry into the gulf of grief, and a collection of dark lullabies that provide momentary distraction from it; Katie Gately‘s second album Loom is a poignant ode to her late Mother, who she lost to cancer in 2018. Set for release via Houndstooth on 14th February, the electronic musician & producer has channelled her grief into eight new songs.

Gately created Loom in the aftermath of her Mother’s cancer diagnosis, thus giving the record it’s dark, melancholy, intensely sobering feel. She used real earthquake recordings in her productions; as well as samples of peacocks screaming, pill bottles shaking, and heavily processed audio from her parent’s wedding to reflect the void left by the loss.

Loom opens with the quiet, hypnotic ‘Ritual’. Layers of Gately’s beguiling vocals ring out over cautious electronics that gently rise and fall in time with her voice. The at times claustrophobic ‘Allay’ personifies the cancer that stole Gately’s Mother. Even without knowledge of this context, it’s still an unsettling listen, with its severe electronics and dense beats.

Inspired by Leonard Cohen – one of her Mother’s favourite artists – ‘Waltz’ is a haunting, powerful call to arms encouraging listeners to dance, even in the midst of overwhelming grief. Gately wrote it after listening to Cohen’s track ‘Take This Waltz’ on repeat for an entire day, resulting in five minutes of dark, energized sound. Following track ‘Bracer’ is a powerful, ten minute eerie epic. It’s also worth noting that it was Gately’s Mother’s favourite track on Loom. 

Along with ‘Waltz’, Gately describes these songs as being about the same thing: “They’re about being disoriented and wanting to check out with a substance. I used whisky.” Both tracks have a manic, kinetic quality; as if the whiskey that fuelled their formation is flowing through the veins of her listeners, encouraging them to perform a contorted dance to Gately’s soundscapes.

Much like opener ‘Ritual’, ‘Rite’ provides a few minutes of breathing space, before dense beats and a menacing blur of sounds on ‘Tower’ make the hairs on the back of the neck twitch. Here, Gately inhabits the medicine that confronts her Mother’s cancer. For the first four minutes, it’s abrasive and severe, but it switches for the final two; with Gately’s soothing vocals acting as a tonic to the toxicity.

The startling, cathartic sounds on penultimate track ‘Flow’ ring out for six powerful minutes. Written from the perspective of her Mother, this track is one of the strongest on the record. Final track ‘Rest’ is announced through Gately’s poignant vocals, closing an album that’s both shocking and soothing in equal measure.

Gately has said that the process of creating Loom is “blurry” to her now, perhaps repressing some of the darker, more desperate feelings that must have permeated it. Whilst her discomfort and grief are audible throughout the record, the fact she confronted her complex emotions proves she is both a genuinely talented musician, and an incredibly brave woman.

Pre-order Katie Gately’s new album Loom here.

Katie Gately UK Live Dates 2020
March 31 – Manchester – The White Hotel
April 1 – London – Cafe Oto (with support from Hinako Omori)

Photo Credit: Steve Gullick

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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Track Of The Day: Half Waif – ‘Ordinary Talk’

Following 2018’s critically acclaimed Lavender, Hudson Valley-based artist Nandi Rose, aka Half Waif, has now announced her upcoming new album.

Reflecting on the acceptance of finding the beauty in being like everyone else, ‘Ordinary Talk’ is filled with captivating glitchy hooks and rich soulful vocals that exude a stirring raw emotion, with shades of later Radiohead. A truly spellbinding slice of poignant alt-pop meditating on the heaviness of ordinary moments.

Of the track, Rose explains:

“Recognizing your own ordinariness can be depressing, or it can be a relief. In Ordinary Talk, I wanted to honour and celebrate my ordinariness as an incredible tool for making me feel less alone. The song is a reassurance that feeling bad – or ‘ill’ – isn’t something that needs to be corrected. There’s a depth of experience that comes from feeling emotions at their extremes. And it is, in fact, this vivid, varied messiness that makes us human and ordinary.”

Watch the striking, theatrical new video for ‘Ordinary Talk’ now:

The Caretaker, the new album from Half Waif, is out 27th March via ANTI records. 

Mari Lane
@marimindles

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Get In Her Ears w/ Dear Pariah 06.02.20

Kate was back on air this week with some of the Get In Her Ears grrrls favourite new music. She played tracks from AyOwA, Ghum, AGAMA, Sink Ya Teeth, Lido Pimienta & Jackie Shane.

Songwriter Dear Pariah also came in to the studio for a chat about her new tracks, ‘Not Ready’ & ‘Felt Your Love’

Listen back here:

Tracklist
Bronski Beat – Smalltown Boy
Lido Pimienta – No Pude
HANYA – I’ll Do It Tomorrow
Dunebug – Uninvited
ALA.NI – Papa
AyOwA – First Frost
Wilsen – Feeling Fancy
May Rosa – Before I Knew
Pet Crow – What We Doin
Ghum – California
Eden Huntur – Weightlessness
Half Waif – Ordinary Talk
AGAMA – Safe In Noise
The Golden Age Of TV – Me, You and a Dog
Jackie Shane – Any Other Way
Dear Pariah – Not Ready
Dear Pariah – Felt Your Love
Genevieve Dawson – Mountain
Deathhags – Be Who You Are
Otta – Near Enough A Woman
Sink Ya Teeth – Somewhere Else
Piney Gir – Puppy Love
Roxy Jackson – Father’s Regrets
Kat Five – Butterfly Wings
Bugeye – Don’t Stop
Pretty Happy – Schmuck
Planningtorock – Beulah Loves Dancing

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