Written on both sides of the Atlantic, from Los Angeles and Austin to Glasgow and London, The Warping is a significant step forward from a band who have already seen strong success. After its release in 2022, Unlearning picked up nominations for the Scottish Album of the Year (SAY) Award and AIM Independent Album of the Year, while shows at SXSW, festivals across Europe and support stints with Primal Scream and Duran Duran saw the band reach new fanbases and cross genre divides.
Taking the cinematic glam of their debut and pushing it further, the band brought in classically trained orchestral musicians. Sonically, the horns, woodwind and swelling string sections lend an entirely new level to the Walt Disco sound - one that feels both fantastically organic and technically accomplished. While the foundations were laid during pre-album recording sessions at Phil Manzanera of Roxy Music’s studio the songs themselves largely come together in collaboration. In comparison to the ‘Frankensteined’ recording process for Unlearning, stitched together across a digital divide of necessity during lockdown, The Warping was co-produced by the band and Chris McCrory, with engineering from The Vale studios’ Chris D’Adda, and the instrumentation is almost entirely analogue.
Deft lyricism takes in deeply personal issues and writes them large, transposing feelings of envy, fear, joy and hope out of individual experiences. Yearning for another self is a recurring dream on The Warping, as they explore gender dysphoria and envy with radical honesty, accepting them as two tangled threads in the same experience. The world, the band note, can feel like a hostile environment at the moment - especially for queer people, trans people, or anyone who is different. But they aren’t going to let that stop them. Jocelyn agrees. ‘If I’m beaten down by it, I’m not going to be able to pay it forward and act accordingly,’ they say. On The Warping, every moment changes with just a trick of the light.
TRACK LISTING
1. Seed
2. Gnomes
3. Come Undone
4. The Warping
5. You Make Me Feel So Dumb
6. Pearl
7. Black Chocolate
8. Jocelyn
9. The Captain
10. Weeping Willow
11. I Will Travel
12. Before The Walls