Foundation Vinyl Newsletter
Welcome
Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Foundation Vinyl newsletter! We have plenty to get stuck into this week with four featured new arrivals.
First, Feel It Records serve up three cracking new albums. Ohio’s Gentle Leader XIV deliver the darkly mesmerising Joke In The Shadow, Cincinnati’s Motorbike the raucous, raw-edged Kick It Over, and Montreal’s Private Lives the ineffably infectious Salt Of The Earth. To round things off in style, on Upset The Rhythm, we have a live album, Actual Earth Music: Volume 1 & 2, capturing the wildly immersive force that is Vancouver Island’s Earth Ball.
I also took the opportunity to replenish our wider Feel It Records stash. Firstly, the recent (tenth!) repress of Hunger For Way Out from Sweeping Promises (write-up below), and then restocks of Hopscotch Fever from Artificial Go and Shiver In A Weak Light from Disintegration. All well worth checking out if you missed them the first time round.
Hunger For A Way Out by Sweeping Promises / Shiver In A Weak Light by Disintegration / Hopscotch Fever by Artificial Go (clockwise)
As always, we also have an updated London gig listing, which includes just announced shows for Me Lost Me, Punter, and Vampire / Shove. We end with a quick rundown on some of the fine records heading our way in the coming weeks, including next week’s haul from Axon, Kaleidoscope, Stress Positions, Tàrega 91, and Xiao!
Featured New Arrivals
Joke In The Shadow by Gentle Leader XIV / Salt Of The Earth by Private Lives / Actual Earth Music: Volume 1 & 2 by Earth Ball / Kick It Over by Motorbike (clockwise)
‘The promise of life, the promise of good, What you’ve done and what you should, It’s better than most, it’s one not both’ (Pig Dream)
Joke In The Shadow is an album of intrinsic, intriguing contrasts. On the one hand, it surges with an arresting sense of gothic drama and, on the other, its musical palette is defined by a stripped back austerity. The drama is courtesy of the powerfully compelling, plaintively evocative vocals that are shrouded in a sense of unyielding dread. These are then interwoven with the sparsely assembled tableau of warmly swelling synths, shards of lean guitar, flares of saxophone, and understated loops of electronic percussion.
This is the Ohio band’s second album and follows an extended hiatus after the release of their 2018 debut, Channels. They deliver their deftly constructed blend of post-punk melancholy and the more uplifting swing of 1980s’ new wave to darkly mesmerising effect. This juxta posing is similarly reflected in the lyrical expressions of grief at our current malaise of late-stage capitalist exploitation and extraction, with a tentative, speculative hope that the future that we fear is not yet inevitable. The shimmering enticement of opener Pig Dream is pitch perfect, with the bleakly contagious Serve The End and the hauntingly hypnotic Reverser ensuring that the spell never relents.
‘I never really thought, That I would end up on my own, Now I’m sitting here, And I’m feeling so alone, And you’re never coming home’ (On My Own)
Montreal’s Private Lives return with their second full-length, Salt Of The Earth, and follow-up to 2023’s excellent debut, Hit Record. The band’s sonic keystone remains an ineffably catchy fusion of garage punk and power pop. Sharply taut guitars (the title track’s core riff is a particularly entrancing) and a crisply punchy rhythm continue to work in vibrant, high octane tandem. They prove the ideal complement to the nasally melodic vocals and layers of supporting harmonies as they explore themes of hyperactive emotions, fragile self-confidence, and doomed relationships.
Yet at the same time, Salt Of The Earth, also feels like a notably confident step forward. There is a real assurance, even swagger, to the songwriting. The fundamentals can appear deceptively straight forward. Yet the band weave them together with such an irresistible zest, fired in equal measure by invention and economy. From the ‘tick tock’ fuelled finale of Time to the outrageously infectious On My Own, by way of the strident chorus of I Get Around this is an album that brims with an unquenchable verve.
Earth Ball are an improvisational collective, hailing from Vancouver Island, whose experimental, noise fuelled maelstroms are all enveloping.
Actual Earth Music: Volume 1 & 2 is the follow-up to the band’s debut studio album from 2024, It’s Yours, and comprises two live sets – the first in Vancouver in 2023 and the other last year at Cafe Oto in Dalston. The latter features guest appearances from pianist Steve Beresford and free jazz percussionist Chris Corsano.
Both sets capture the band at their frenzied, inventive best. Waves of instrumentation are incrementally layered upon one another, the intensity relentlessly ratcheted up. The rhythm section’s propulsion is often rooted initially in jazz, before locking into passages of more methodical, mechanical vehemence. Meanwhile, the saxophone and guitar weave their serpentine individual patterns, squalling, skronking, dissonant, and yet somehow organically intertwined, while semi-shouted, almost disembodied, vocals occasionally emerge from the sonic barrage.
The disparate strands inexorably converge as one to an ecstatic crescendo, before then steadily deconstructing again to end on a haunting whisper. Those eruptions, when each element of the band locks into a single overriding groove, land with a fierce potency that would be the envy of many hardcore bands. I had the good fortune to catch the London show and this album vividly captures the unique marriage of fervour and precision that defined that utterly immersive performance.
‘It’s a lovely day for a hurricane, so now go float with the debris through halls, a diplomat in boots has once pulled up your roots, now it’s a rodeo so go float’ (Cold Sweat)
Hailing from Cincinnati and sharing members with Crime Of Passing and The Drin, Motorbike return with their second full-length, Kick It Over. The raucous, 1970s’ tinged punk rock of their 2023 self-titled debut remains in full effect, all surging guitars, shout-along choruses, and rock’n’roll strut. Yet the band’s sound feels more fully realised now, dextrously harnessed to ensure that none of its raw-edged vitality is in any way diluted.
Proceedings kick off in suitably vigorous style with the rollicking one-two of openers Scrap Heap and Currency. The band then prove thoroughly adept at morphing their base elements into intriguing new forms as they sweep from the quietly infectious Cold Sweat to the languidly escalating Gears Never Dry, and then the bluegrass twang of Quite Nice.
Vivid flares of saxophone and tambourine fuel the atmosphere of bittersweet hedonism. One that is further amplified by the gruffly rasping vocals as they paint a fractured, poetic picture of life’s daily struggles, where devil may care and urgent desperation are difficult to distinguish.
‘Dim the lights, The lights, The Life, Has gone out from their eyes, But they’ve still got their appetites’ (An Appetite)
Hunger For A Way Out is the 2020 debut album from post-punk duo Sweeping Promises and is remarkably now on to its 10th press. It is not hard to see why. Strikingly spartan yet unerringly infectious riffs are underpinned by looping bass lines and spryly bouncing drums, which are in turn leavened by fleeting flourishes of electronic brass to create a soundtrack that is as deeply engaging as it is minimalist in execution.
Yet even then, it is, perhaps, the vocals that steal the show. Stridently melodic, delightfully nuanced, and saturated in a rich pop sensibility, they deploy repetition to powerful effect. They also inject a notable warmth and energy to proceedings as they grapple with society’s suffocating appetites. There is also a satisfying spareness to the songwriting, the clear sense of a tightly defined lens inspiring the band to test those parameters to their very limits.
From the opening riff of the title track your attention is seized. The vocalised motif to Cross Me Out is genuinely spine tingling, and the momentum never drops for even a moment from the starkly resonant bass line of Blue to the eerily enticing An Appetite. Once you have immersed yourself in the album, the fact that it was recorded in its entirety using a single microphone in an abandoned concrete laboratory feels entirely fitting.
Shows And Tours
Lawful Killing at New River Studios, Friday 30th May
This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing! It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in. I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider UK tour.
May
6th Blow Your Brains Out, T.S. Warspite, Always Watching, Hellscape (The Grace / UK Tour)
7th Agnostic Front, Crown Court plus more (The Underworld / UK Tour)
14th Muro, Second Death, Secrecy (New River Studios / UK tour)
17th Boom Boom Kid, Traidora, plus more (The Shacklewell Arms / UK Tour)
19th Time Heist, Uncertainty, Equals What? (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
20th Whores, Help, Ritual Error (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
21st Indikator B, Koridor, Es, Hellscape (New River Studios / UK Tour)
25th Public Acid, Tramadol, Stingray, Traidora (New River Studios / UK Tour)
25th Onelinedrawing, Secondary Education (The Waiting Room / UK Tour)
30th Lawful Killing, Imposter, Frisk, Last Orders, Scab (New River Studios)
30th Quinie, Sound Of Yell, Harry Gorski Brown (St Pancras Old Church)
31st Vampire, Shove, Catastrophe, One By One, Röt (The Old Blue Last / UK Tour)
31st Feral State, Regimes, Do One, Vile Rapture (New River Studios)
June
3rd Ultras, Xiao, Grandad, Aku, This Hurts (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
9th Moral Bombing, Blossom Decay, Diall (Blondies / UK Tour)
14th P.A.I.N, Hiatus, Zero Again, Instant Ruin, Ancient Lights (New Cross Inn)
16th Alien Nosejob, Middleman, Fatberg (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
17th Contention, Long Goodbye, Hour Of Reprisal (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
18th Iron Lung, Bad Breeding, Frisk, Total Con, Casing (New River Studios / Sold Out)
18th Terror, Jivebomb, No Relief (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
19th Necron 9, Cicada, Pyrex, Last Affront, Second Death (New River Studios / UK Tour)
22nd Fuckin’ Lovers, Hez, Total Nada plus more (New River Studios / UK Tour)
July
3rd Quiet Fear, Wreathe , Death Of Youth (Paper Dress Vintage)
3rd Destiny Bond, Big Laugh, Flesh Creep, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
4th Fentanyl, Kute, Do One, Unreal Cruelty (New Cross Inn)
5th All Out War, Last Wishes, Temple Guard, King Street (New Cross Inn)
7th Stick To Your Guns, Love Letter plus more (Downstairs At The Dome / UK Tour)
7th Xibalba, Extinguish, Mutagenic Host (New Cross Inn)
7th /8th The Messthetics & Brandon Lewis (Cafe Oto)
8th Terminal Sleep, Spaced, Still In Love (New Cross Inn)
18th Punter plus support (Venue tbc)
August
6th Me Lost Me, The Silver Field (St Pancras Old Church)
October
30th Godflesh plus support (Scala)
November
3rd City Of Caterpillar, Incaseyouleave plus more (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)
Coming Soon
Cities Of Fear by Kaleidoscope lands next week
13th May
Axon ‘Axon’ 7-inch (Not For The Weak)
Kaleidoscope ‘Cities Of Fear’ 12-inch (La Vida Es Un Mus)
Stress Positions ‘Human Zoo’ 12-inch (Three One G)
Tàrrega 91 ‘Ckaos Total’ 12-inch (La Vida Es Un Mus)
Xiao ‘Control’ 12-inch (Twelve Gauge)
20th May
Grand Scheme ‘Grand Scheme’ 7-inch (11PM)
Headsplitter ‘Curse Of Life’ 12-inch (Toxic State)
Heaven’s Gate ‘Tales From A Blistering Paradise’ 12-inch (Beach Impediment)
Nisemono ‘Nisemono’ 12-inch (Toxic State)
Paranoid ‘MMXXII’ 12-inch (Beach Impediment)
Later In May
Cicada ‘Wicked Dream’ 7-inch (Unlawful Assembly)
Cinder Well ‘Cinder Well’ 12-inch (Contraszt)
Destruxion America ‘Self-Titled’ 12-inch (Unlawful Assembly)
Fugitive Bubble ‘What Happens If We Stop’ 12-inch (Sorry State)
Hubert Selby Jr Infants ‘Bingo’ 12-inch (Super Fi)
Innuendo ‘Peace And Love’ 12-inch (Unlawful Assembly)
Iron Lung ‘Adapting // Crawling’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)
Mother Nature ‘Loving, Joyful And Free’ 12-inch (Static Shock)
Mutated Void ‘Tarnished’ 7-inch (Unlawful Assembly)
Necron 9 ‘People Die’ 12-inch (Unlawful Assembly)
Shatter ‘Deny The Future’ 7-inch (Desolate)
Svffer ‘Eternity Moment’ 12-inch (Contraszt)
June
Artificial Go ‘Musical Chairs’ 12-inch (Feel It)
Karma Sutra ‘The Daydreams Of A Production Line Worker’ 12-inch (Sealed Records)
Kilynn Lunsford ‘Promiscuous Genes’ 12-inch (Feel It)
Lung ‘The Swankeeper’ 12-inch (Feel It)
Plasma ‘Mua Et Voi Omistaa’ 12-inch (Sorry State)