Be Prepared: White Laces | Self-Titled EP | Late October

Richmond-based noise luminaries White Laces will release in late October a stirring, self-titled 12" EP. The short set is being released by Whole Ghost/Shdwply and it can be pre-ordered right here. Those who pre-order the 12" will receive digital versions of the EP's five tracks as well as other unspecified bonus stuffs. White Laces will tour to support the release of the EP, but then get right back to releasing new music. A single is expected on the recently commissioned Richmond indie label The Acme Thunderer, and an unspecified number of music videos to accompany tracks on White Laces are also in the works. This is technically your second warning regarding White Laces; the first came late last month in the context of this announcement of the forthcoming Lubec EP. White Laces has posted a goodly amount of material to Soundcloud, and we've embedded below the cascading anthem "Sick Of Summer" below. We previously wrote about White Laces' HSAL #9 EP here in April.

Sick of Summer by White Laces

Be Prepared: Lubec | Nothing Is Enough EP Teaser "Cherry Adair"

If you harbored some concern that the nascent Virginia noise-pop scene we chronicled last year with these features on Cinemasophia and Lubec had fallen fallow, fear not. Cinemasophia is no more, but band principal Landis Wine has been hard at work churning out compelling music with his White Laces project (more on that soon). And now we have word that self-professed Lilys disciples Lubec will return this fall with a new, self-produced record and new label.

The label, The Acme Thunderer, is slated to launch Oct. 9, and it will release that day Lubec's very promising, six-song Nothing Is Enough! EP. The short stack of songs will be available on CD, vinyl and digital download, and the collection is one of a half-dozen or so The Acme Thunderer is slated to issue. Other releases in the pipeline include collections from the aforementioned White Laces and Ghost Lotion. Those acts and Lubec play a launch party for the label Oct. 9 at Gallery5 in Richmond, VA. Lubec aims to begin recording for a planned full-length release that it hopes will see the light of day in early 2011, in time for some spring touring and a trip to the annual SXSW music confabulation.

Lubec's Eddie Charlton got in touch and gave us the go-ahead to post Nothing Is Enough!'s brilliant "Cherry Adair," whose stream or download you can grab below. Based on the metadata with the file, the song is slated to sit in the center of the EP, but it is certainly strong enough to be a lead cut. The production is a bit remote (think Black Tambourine), but that is solved by cranking the volume, something you'll be compelled to do about a minute in when the first pre-chorus explodes. What first pushes the song deep into genius territory is the little melodic hook in the chorus, "I don't know why everybody seems to know your name." And then there is a transporting guitar solo. Is this what Lilys would sound like covering Silver Jews? We think it is, and we can't wait to hear more.

Lubec's "Cherry Adair"
[stalk the The Acme Thunderer site for pre-order information for Nothing Is Enough!]

Today's Hotness: Pernice Brothers, Yuck, White Laces

>> The muse has led indie rock veteran Joe Pernice from the damp, nicotine-stained Americana of Scud Mountain Boys through lush and crystalline New Order-influenced territory and into the singer-songwritery companion album to his charming 2009 novel "It Feels So Good When I Stop." Little did we expect that the Toronto-based artist -- who once called Massachusetts home -- would come roaring back with the rocker posted below, "Jacquline Susann." The tune, from the forthcoming fifth Pernice Brothers set Goodbye, Killer is long on organ drone and jangly guitar and touts a fringe of straight British Invasion pop sounds. It reminds us of the stark stylistic change Lilys underwent between the mind-alteringly good Eccsame The Photon Band and the vintage Kinks-channeling tour de force Better Can't Make Your Life Better. Ashmont Records will release Goodbye, Killer June 15, and we have no way of knowing whether the 138-second rocker "Jacquiline Susann" is representative of the entire set. But we really don't care -- it's great. Have a listen.

Pernice Brothers -- "Jacquline Susann" -- Goodbye, Killer
[right click and save as]
[buy Pernice Brothers music from Joe Pernice's site right here]

>> Impressive young London-based indie rock quartet Yuck totally has our number, having hit us square between the heart and soul with each of the four demos we've heard. The band's latest effort is the ballad "Suicide Policeman," and it was posted for free download at its web site earlier this week, and it is brilliant. We have here yearning Yo La Tengo-esque vocals, tremelo'd guitar, enough grit around the edges to make the entire proceeding evoke all the best in early '90s indie rock. And then when you think you've got the track pegged, enter the horns! According to It's Getting Boring By The Sea, our source for all news Yuck, the band has just been brought on to support a Dinosaur Jr. tour date in the U.K. Not too shabby, particularly since this act only has one single to its name right now to our knowledge (and it is only a split). But we love what they are doing, and we love "Suicide Policeman." Download the track below.

Yuck -- "Suicide Policeman" -- Demo
[right click and save as]

>> Devoted readers may recall our review of Virginia-based indie rock concern Cinemasophia's third and final full length Fits + Cycles last year. The band has since splintered and singer/guitarist Landis Wine has launched a new project, White Laces. Based on what we've heard, White Laces is a little more aggressive, a little more lo-fi and a little more tuneful than Cinemasophia. Mr. Wine has graciously consented to allow us to offer a stream of the new track "Motorik Twilight," which will be released on an EP digitally and on audiocassette May 11 by Lynchburg, VA-based micro-indie Harding Street Assembly Lab. The noise-pop song, which throbs in 3/4 time and touts a lo-fi attack that suggests Guided By Voices under a crippling load of psychedelics, is one of four on the HSAL #9 EP. Curiously, we don't perceive at all the Teutonic rhythm that is the song's namesake, but even so we think you'll enjoy this freak-out a great deal. The rest of White Laces' year sounds busy; it includes some short stints on the road as well as getting back in the studio to record a planned 10", as many as two 7" singles and perhaps another cassette release. For now, catch the stream of "Motorik Twilight" below.

Review: Cinemasophia | Fits & Cycles [MP3]

2009, here is your headphones-required record. After what seems like years of preparation, Richmond, VA-based dreampop quintet Cinemasophia returns next month with its third long-player. Fits & Cycles, as its name somewhat suggests, is a feverish collection of mid-tempo rockers appointed with dizzying compositional and production flourishes. To steal a line from Radiohead, Fits & Cycles talks in math, buzzes like a fridge, and is -- on occasion -- like a detuned radio. It is the most sonically sculpted set we've heard this year, and repeated listens reveal greater and greater dimension in the production and recording.

Forthright opener "Detailed Night" cycles through -- we think -- 3/8, 3/4 and 5/4 time while lazery synths dart across the mix, a mix that occasionally makes room for xylophone and big reverbs. A surprising amount of this record is not in traditional rock 4/4, although the proceedings are more fluid than angular despite syncopation that is mortared in like bricks at seemingly every turn. The biggest number on the set is "Failed Drum Circle," a track with traded -- and Unrest-esque -- girl/guy vocals that meanders and percolates for just over two minutes before blossoming into a dense, lush, melodic crescendo that will give you chills. The section only lasts about 30 seconds, but it is perhaps the biggest 30 seconds of the records. A close second is the syncopated rocker "Neutral Burst," which is decidedly non-linear but houses in its midst a throbbing, distorted bridge that underpins an ethereal female vocal section. The tune reminds us very much of the stuff on the bootleg Lilys demos collection Early Demos. The delightful, heavily tremeloed "Pet Enemies" mashes spectral funk and pop meanderings.

Fits & Cycles -- leaks of which we started encountering all around the Internet last week without even looking -- was recorded by Richmond engineering mainstay John Morand at Sound Of Music and mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side. Cinemasophia has been soliciting remixes from various corners to be packaged with the digital release of Fits & Cycles, most notably from Lilys mastermind Kurt Heasley, who is apparently currently calling Central Virginia home. Little Black Cloud releases Fits & Cycles April 7 digitally and on CD; according to the label the vinyl release is still a few months off. As we noted in our first post about Cinemasophia here, the band also plans to record tracks for a new single and EP later this year, making 2009 perhaps the band's most productive year of its five-year history.

Cinemasophia -- "Failed Drum Circle" -- Fits & Cycles
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[pre-order from Little Black Cloud here]

03/26 -- Johnny Brenda’s -- Philadephia, PA
03/27 -- The Czar -- Richmond, VA
03/28 -- The Laundromat -- Charlottesville, VA
04/03 -- Album Release Party @ Sound of Music -- Richmond, VA
04/04 -- MACRoCK -- Harrisonburg, VA
04/28 -- Cameo -- Brooklyn, New York

Cinemosophia: Internerds | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

Today's Hotness: The Hush Now, Cinemasophia

>> We were very impressed by The Hush Now's record release show last Thursday night, and only work and a trip over the weekend kept us from offering something more like a proper review. There are a couple important things to note that underline the fact that The Hush Now is a band to watch. First, this was technically the band's live debut. And we don't just mean this particular line-up of the band, we mean it was their first gig, and The Hush Now was very convincing: no muffed cues, no noticeable botching of anything, just big guitars and big anthems. Second, bandleader Noel Kelly told us prior to the show that the quintet had only rehearsed four times. Third, despite it being the band's live debut (we don't think a radio session with Pipeline! earlier in the week counts), the room in front of the stage at TT's was filled -- a bit shy of packed. We've been in that room a lot of nights with bigger bands drawing fewer people, so the turnout -- for a band whose players describe themselves as hermits -- speaks to a level of interest that we expect even surprises Mr. Kelly. The Hush Now played rockers including "Sadie Hawkins Dance," "Pining," a new and unfinished tune "Constellations" and debut album highlight "Traditions" (the last track featured a vocal cameo from very cool original Hush Now bassist Mike DiMinno). In lieu of further discussion we offer this link to a Flickr slideshow of snapshots we took during the set. The Hush Now's next gig is May 1 at TT's, as part of a fine evening curated by Bradley's Almanac.

>> If you read yesterday's feature about Lubec and were intrigued by the idea of the band having a more established, sonically similar scene peer in Cinemasophia, you are not alone. We spent a fair amount of time Monday night listening to the tracks at the latter act's MySpace outpost and we like what we heard. Cinemasophia is a five-year-old quintet. Unlike Lubec, the act has a couple releases under its collective belt, and Cinemasophia will release a long-labored-on (the band was mid-way through recording it 13 months ago) new collection, Fits & Cycles, April 7 on Little Black Cloud. Fits & Cycles was recorded by Richmond engineering mainstay John Morand at Sound Of Music and mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side. Cinemasophia intends to digitally reissue its two prior full-length efforts, Dialectic and Whole Ghosts, sometime in 2009. Currently floating about is a tour-only EP with some of the new material already on it (the track listing is posted at the Little Black Cloud MySpace wigwam right here, as is a stream of the new track "Detailed Night" -- stick around and listen to the tremelo-tastic beauty by Ringfinger, "Four Misused Letters"). Tour? Why yes, Cinemasophia have a handful of dates booked over the next two months, including a couple at the end of this week in New York. We're posting all of the band's dates below some free downloads we found at Last.FM. We particularly dig "Humming & Entropy," which explodes after about ninety seconds into a big crescendo of distorted guitar, and generally sounds a fair amount like Lorelei. Dig it.

Cinemasophia -- "Humming & Entropy" -- Dialectic
Cinemasophia -- "Buried In Blooms" -- Whole Ghosts
[right click and save as]
[buy the Cinemasophia CD EP from Little Black Cloud here]

02/19 -- The Cake Shop -- New York, NY
02/20 -- Secret Show in Brooklyn -- Brooklyn, NY
02/22 -- The Reservoir -- Chapel Hill, NC
03/26 -- Johnny Brenda’s -- Philadephia, PA
03/27 -- The Czar -- Richmond, VA

>> Superman Revenge Squad's second full-length will be recorded live next month during an appearance in April and be titled We're Here For Duration, We Hope if all goes as planned. Squad mastermind Ben Parker also reports here that he intends to begin playing with a drummer and cellist, which conjures some interesting, perhaps even exciting, possibilities. Superman Revenge Squad's This Is My Own Personal Way Of Dealing With It All was one of our favorite records of 2008. We interviewed Parker here in October.

Show Us Yours #13: Lubec

It is no secret we love the band Lilys, so we generally sit up and take notice when we get an email from a band that leads off with something like "we love Lilys." Which is basically what Richmond, VA-based shoegaze/psych-pop quintet Lubec did, and so here we are today to share with you their excellent de facto single "Gang Knife Battles." We like to feature new and upcoming bands at :: clicky clicky ::, but we think Lubec may be one of the newest, as it hasn't yet released anything. But they will apparently issue sometime this year a self-titled EP that was recently recorded with John Morand (Sparklehorse, September 67, Labradford) at Sound Of Music in Richmond. What else do we know? Certain of the members of Lubec used to be in the defunct act Tallest Highest. That's about it. As we really feel like this band is on to something, we touched base with Lubec's guitarist/singer Eddie Charlton and drummer/singer Brandon Martin to get a read on Lubec, its native Richmond and its practice space.

CC: Why did you choose/why do you use this space?

EC: Basically, [because] Christians are nice folk. In Williamsburg (where we practice), spaces are next to impossible to find. Eddie had a connection through a previous band to the Baptist Student’s Union (a seven-degrees-of-separation-type deal). Kids live there and everything, but they’ve been oh-so generous in letting us use their large common room with the PA system.

CC: Explain how an idiosyncracy or quirk of this space or a former practice space has affected a song (or even your overall sound).

EC: We don’t say fuck in our songs anymore because we’re afraid of being baptized.

CC: You walk into your space. What's the first thing you smell? Why?

EC: The place smells like an office... because it kind of is. I mean, we miss the beer/piss/vomit/gasoline smell of typical practice spaces, but Christians have a cleaning service, and it ain’t bad.

CC: We were surprised to learn about Lubec, particularly that you embrace the shoegaze sounds of one of our favorite bands (Lilys). Without making any enemies, can you give us an overview of the indie rock scene in Richmond right now (ahhh, what the hell, make an enemy or two)? The only thing we know about the scene is Avail and Carbon Leaf, so we've always assumed that all bands in Richmond sound like Avail or Carbon Leaf. Are there a lot of bands into the shoegaze thing and heavy guitar pop sounds, or is Lubec more the exception than the rule?

EC: Ah... you overlooked possibly Richmond's greatest musical export: GWAR. Plus, don't forget Lamb of God! But seriously, Richmond is a strange town, musically speaking. Hardcore music is huge, and there are lots of small venues that cater to that scene. But Richmond does have some great guitar pop bands. There is a band out of Richmond called Cinemasophia that we are friendly with that has a bona fide shoegaze/math rock thing going on. Prabir and The Substitutes seem to dig that sound as well, we’d like to play with them. Richmond's indie rock problem is an overall lack of cohesion. There is almost too much diversity. The bands that share certain sonic similarities just don't stick together. To be honest, we’re considering moving to another city sometime in the summer.

CC: What do the next six months look like for Lubec?

EC: We have finally gotten everything together to record a full-length album this spring in our own studio (oh no...). We really just want to play as many shows in the area as possible and hopefully organize an East Coast tour in May/June. We're writing a lot of new songs, and we're all just really excited to be playing with each other. We're just having a blast working out group harmonies and screwing with all the cool sounds. It's nice to have it all finally come together!

Lubec -- "Gang Knife Battles" -- Lubec EP
[right click and save as]
[EP forthcoming]

Lubec: Internets | MySpace | YouTube | Flickr

Previous Show Us Yours episodes:
Shapes And Sizes | Dirty On Purpose | Relay | Mobius Band | Frightened Rabbit | Assembly Now | Meneguar | Okay Paddy | Charmparticles | Calories | Sun Airway | It Hugs Back