Flock is a brand new collaboration between five leading musicians from London's open-minded jazz and experimental scenes: Bex Burch (Vula Viel), Sarathy Korwar, Dan "Danalogue" Leavers (Soccer96, The Comet Is Coming), Al MacSween (Maisha) and Tamar Osborn (Collocutor).

The musicians were first brought together by drummer Sarathy Korwar during March 2020 for one of Boiler Room, Total Refreshment Centre and Night Dreamer’s more memorable streamed sessions from early lockdown. It caught the attention of Strut Records and the label presented an open offer for the musicians to create a new, completely freeform project.

Gathering together at The Fish Factory in London Summer 2020, the approach was to try something fresh. "I wrote texts as scores for the session and the emphasis was on breathing and listening to each other", explains Bex Burch. "Improvisation is composition in itself, so although the music was freely improvised, we sometimes chose to stay on form and rhythm, repeating melodies and groove."

Tracks include the pulsing, searching opener ‘Expand’, the taught soundscape ‘Prepare To Let Go’ and the frenetic, urgent ‘Bold Dream’. At times widescreen and cinematic and at others more tense and claustrophobic, each Flock piece explores its own colour and mood.

"Every moment in this process has been a new journey into the unknown. Everyone came, breathed and brought openness of heart, ears, lungs and wings."

Artwork is based on an exclusive new illustration piece by Muhammad Rofi Fatchurofi.

TRACK LISTING

01 / A1. Expand
02 / A2. Prepare To Let Go
03 / A3. Sounds Welcome
04 / B1. It’s Complicated
05 / B2. What Purpose
06 / C1. Murmuration
07 / C2. Bold Dream
08 / C3. My Resonance
09 / D1. How Many Are One
10 / D2. Fully Breathed

On her second full-length record, Head of Roses, Jenn Wasner follows a winding thread of intuition into the unknown and into healing, led by gut feelings and the near-spiritual experience of visceral songwriting. The result is a combination of Wasner’s ability to embrace new levels of vulnerability, honesty and openness, with the self-assuredness that comes with a decade-plus career as a songwriter, producer, multi-instrumentalist and prolific collaborator.  Simply put, Head of Roses is a record about heartbreak, but from a dualistic perspective. It’s about the experience of having one’s heart broken and breaking someone else’s heart at the same time. But beyond that, it’s about having to reconcile the experience of one’s own pain with the understanding that it’s impossible to go through life without being the source of great pain for someone else.

“Part of the journey for me has been learning to take responsibility for the parts of things that are mine, even when I’m in a lot of pain through some behavior or action of someone else. If I’m expecting to be forgiven for the things I’ve done and the choices I’ve made and the mistakes that I’ve made, it would be incredibly cowardly and hypocritical to not also do the work that’s required to forgive others the pain they caused me.” Showcasing the depth of Wasner’s songwriting capabilities and the complexity of her vision, Head of Roses calls upon her singular ability to create a fully-formed sonic universe via genre-bending amalgamation of songs and her poetic and gut punch lyrics. It’s the soundtrack of Wasner letting go – of control, of heartbreak, and of hiding who she is: “I think I’ve finally reached a point in my career where I feel comfortable enough with myself and what I do, that I’m able to relax into a certain simplicity or straight forwardness that I wasn’t comfortable with before.” Head of Roses puts Wasner’s seismically powerful voice front and center. Those vocals help thread it all together -- it’s a textured musicality, quilted together by intentionality and intuition. Wasner and producer Nick Sanborn (Sylvan Esso, Made of Oak) assembled Head of Roses in the same way you’d put together a mixtape, painstakingly and carefully melding disparate parts into a whole, transcending genre to weave a story of heartache and healing together.

And in the same way a homemade, painstakingly-crafted mixtape plays out, with the maker’s fingerprints left all over its songs – so goes Head of Roses. Carefully curated and culled from the depths of Wasner’s heartbreak and healing, it’s deeply, intensely personal. But just as we change ourselves by embracing the pain of loss and uncertainty, so too are the purpose of these songs changed through the act of creating them. Having succeeded in healing the person who made them, they now exist for those who find them in their own moments of need. Always in motion, the original spirit of creation has already flown from this place—but it’s left behind a blueprint, a tool for you, to lean on, too.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Wasner's wonderfully evocative style of songwriting encompasses all of the melodicism and movement in her partnership with Any Stack for Wye Oak, but with a superb audible palette of influence seeping into the sound. Echoes of 80's synth and classic rock mix with soaring guitars and funky rolling bass. A wonderful triumph, and most importantly a great listen.

TRACK LISTING

1. 2 Heads
2. Price Of Blue
3. Two
4. Hard Way
5. Walking
6. Lightning
7. One More Hour
8. No Question
9. Awake For The Sunrise
10. Head Of Roses

One of the North-West’s finest exponents of otherworldly pop has landed back on earth with an album of shimmering space age bliss. Elements of disco, new wave and krautrock are undoubtedly present in Flock, but Jane never relies on genre tropes to carry her work. Instead, she harnesses familiar rhythmic devices and choices of instrumentation in her own distinctive way. And while comparisons could be drawn between Jane and contemporaries like Vanishing Twin and Gwenno, she has undeniably staked out her own domain within the realm of off-kilter synth pop.

Throughout Flock Jane demonstrates her delicate vocal agility over a series of hypnotic loops and clever synthesis. The lazy disco strut of “The Revolution Of Super Visions” sets up a jangling interplay between Jane’s sweetly sung declamations, new wave style guitar interjections and Cowley-esque synth squelch. While “Modern Reputation” is propelled forwards by a Broadcast style motorik rhythm with electronics whirring in the background and mantra-like vocal loops swirling in a strange ecstasy.

In the title track Jane’s gauzy vocals reverberate over the ebb and flow of a loose knit groove, while in “Sunset Dreams” ornate guitar riffs weave in amongst a haze of twinkling chimes and fizzing sawtooth synthesis. The album culminates in a moment of escapist pop euphoria with final track “Solarised”, laden with cascading arps and irresistible vocal hooks. Once again Jane has succeeded in creating something playful, fresh and unpretentious which is in equal parts a fun and intelligent listen. All hail the cosmic synth queen! 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: This new outing from Jane Weaver sees Jane and co skirting the outer reaches of Disco, Synth-pop and ambient to stunning effect, rich with hooks but unmeasurably deep, it's one that will reveal more and more with each listen. Unsurprisingly superb.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1 Heartlow
A2 The Revolution Of Super Visions
A3 Stages Of Phases
A4 Lux
A5 Modern Reputation
Side B
B1 Flock
B2 Sunset Dreams
B3 All The Things You Do
B4 Pyramid Schemes
B5 Solarised

Flock Of Dimes is Jenn Wasner. Wasner is one half of Wye Oak as well as Dungeonesse.

Across all of her projects Jenn balances experimentation with craft, unafraid to be vulnerable - from 10+ years co-creating the novel, guitar-driven Wye Oak repertoire to purposefully putting out several two-at-a-time 7”s as Flock Of Dimes or exploring electronic textures as Dungeonesse.

Wasner wrote, performed and self-produced the record, with help from frequent collaborators Mickey Freeland in Baltimore and Aaron Roche in NYC. It was mixed in Dallas by John Congleton (St. Vincent, Angel Olsen).

“‘Semaphore’ is a song for people who make better art than they do small talk. In spite of all of the chaos behind the song, though, its sound feels comforting and triumphant. Through each verse, Wasner gets stronger.” - NPR