Um disco absolutamente essencial para ser degustado neste 2015 é Burnt Black Cars dos canadenses do Slow Down Molasses.
Uma elegante e sofisticada viagem ao grandioso eloquente mundo do pós punk com trejeitos modernos e nuances de shoegazer, bem pouco, sempre em níveis de soberba. Todo o álbum é conduzido pela excelente combinação melódica dos caras.
Um trabalho de tonalidades épicas. Essencial.
***** Interview with Slow Down Molasses *****
Q. When did Slow Down Molasses start? Tell us about the history...
I started the band about 9 years ago as a pseudo-solo project. I wanted to start a band that could evolve with whoever was around and available/excited to play. As a result there has be 20 or 30 people who've played on records and or toured with us. The last 4 years the band has settled into a consistent 5 piece line up. This latest record was written as this line up. Prior to this line up we'd been playing as a 6 or 7 piece for a long time. Once we started touring internationally that settled into being a 5 piece. That also coincided us really embracing more of an electric sound. Initially I'd often play acoustic guitar on stage and be backed by violin, cello, horns in addition to the same old rock instrumentation (i.e. drums/bass/guitars). These last few years we've traded the strings and horns for (more) delay pedals and synths. In some ways I feel like we're still aiming for a similar type of song, we're just using different sounds to build those songs. Instead of trying to sound like Mojave 3 more acoustic songs, it ends up being more like Slowdive's most feedback-drenched songs.
Q: Who are your influences?
When I started Slow down, I was aiming for a mix of Will Oldham, Mojave 3, The Delgados, the dirty three, and Mogwai. I still count all of those as some of my favorite bands and as huge influences, but these last few years we've really embraced the noisier side of our record collections, so stuff like Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine, the Jesus and Mary Chain, Eric's Trip, and aforementioned Slowdive and Mogwai.
Q. Make a list of 5 albums of all time…
That's always tough, but inevitably, these five are always in my top ten or twenty. Eric's Trip's Love Tara is likely the one that may be the least known, but it's easily the most important one to me (and likely all my bandmates). They were first Canadian band signed to Sub Pop and for our peers in Canada, they are likely one of the most important and influential bands ever and Love Tara is their master piece.
Eric's Trip - Love Tara
the dirty three - Whatever You Love You Are
The Delgado's - The Great Eastern
My Bloody Valentine - Loveless
Mogwai - Rock Action
Q. How do you feel playing live?
I love it. It's such a wonderful, cathartic, celebratory experience. I don't know if it's because I was very late to starting to play in bands (I didn't pick up a guitar until I was 17 and didn't join a band until I was 23) or if it would be the same if I grew up playing in bands, but I feel like any time I get to play music with other people it's a moment to be savoured. Having grown up in a small town with no music scene, the thought of playing in a band was such a foreign concept, it wasn't something anyone I knew did, so I just assumed it was not something I could or would ever do. Having that background and being a huge music fan from a young age, I think I may always feel that it's such a rare treat to get to play with music in a band. Additionally this latest incarnation of the band has really made it even more enjoyable. Everyone is on the same page musically and we tend to feed off each other a fair bit on stage, create a pretty intense (and slightly exhausting) live show. It's wonderful just to play, let alone get to tour to many lovely, far off cities like we have.
Q. How do you describe Slow Down Molasses sounds?
I feel like I'm a bit lazy doing this, but there is a line in our bio that Chrix Morix (our bass player) wrote, describing the sound as "expansive, texture-heavy pop songs that are prone to breaking into storm squalls of drone, delay and feedback". I think that captures what we do pretty well or at least I don't think I could describe it any better!
Q: Tell us about the process of recording the songs?
We've somewhat been a bit unlucky with recording. We have a good friend, Jordan Smith, who we've done almost all of our recording with and it seems nearly every time we've been ready to record, he's been in the process of renovating or moving his studio, so we have a history of doing a lot of short, focused sessions, usually in half renovated studios. But in general we've been pretty indulgent in layering and lot of tracks on our records. The last album, Walk Into The Sea, I usually would do two or three guitar tracks myself and a two or three layers of vocals....and there was another guitar player and another vocalist + strings, horns to add after that.
Burnt Black Cars was a much more focused affair, with some of the songs almost being recorded live or at least each of us only recorded one or two tracks per song. A lot of the songs were written more collaboratively and we'd road tested many of them, so I think we had a much better idea of how to make it sound the way we wanted it to, without relying on a overdubs.
Q. Which new bands do you recommended
We're all huge music fans, so we there is alot we are excited about, including a lot from our home town of Saskatoon and some of the surrounding cities. Shooting Guns is a fantastic heavy, instrumental doomy post-rock band (though they like calling themselves metal, so they may get annoyed with me for calling them post-rock). The Foggy Notions (
https://thefoggynotions.bandcamp.com/) is a great local janglepop/powerpop/shoegaze band. The Avulsions (
https://theavulsions.bandcamp.com/releases) are a really cool post-punk/noise rock band. All three of those are from Saskatoon. Otherwise, I really dig Betrayers! from Edmonton (that I know you've already featured) and just these last few months I've been really liking Dilly Dally (
https://dillydally.bandcamp.com/) from Toronto. They seem like they are going to get a lot of people excited right away.
Q: Which bands would you love to make a cover version of?
We recently recorded a quick and dirty demo of an Elevator to Hell song called Why I Didn't Like August '93. I'd love to properly finish that or just release it as is. It seems what we recorded would fit their aesthetic. Elevator to Hell is a great lofi noisepop/psych-sludge band from Canada's east cost. So if anyone wants to do a split 7" with us contributing that song, do get in touch!
Q: What´s the plan for the future....
We've got a bunch of Canadian shows coming up in August and September and after that we're hoping to get back to the U.K./Europe and or the do more shows in the U.S.. We've had such a great response the last couple years in Europe, so we're just waiting for the right situation to get back there. It seems we always need a festival invite or some similar to make it make sense to fly all the way over there, so it takes a bit of coordinating. Similarly we'd love to spend more time in the U.S., but it can be so expensive to get a VISA to play there that it often seems easier to play the U.K. than the U.S.
Otherwise, we've got a lot of new songs written, so we're going to be spending time in the studio this summer/fall. I'm not sure when or how those songs will be released, but we're really keen to share our new song with people, so even though Burnt Black Cars just came out in May, I'm hoping we'll have some new recordings to share relatively soon. I definitely don't want to take 4 years between records again. That was much too long.
Q: Any parting words?
Thanks for getting in touch. It's so great to know that there are people that love the kind of music we love in Brazil. We'd love to make it to your country some day....so if any festival bookers are promoters are reading, do get in touch!
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Thanks
http://slowdownmolasses.com/
https://www.facebook.com/slowdownmolasses
