Archie Bronson Outfit
BIOGRAPHY –
Keep your knickers on – soon will be the dawn of the third full length from the much acclaimed Archie Bronson Outfit. Early indications (such as ‘Shark’s Tooth’, the LP’s first single, currently available for free download – see below) point to a more dance-friendly, groove orientated record while the dark shaky howls of lead singer Sam Windett continue to ground the band in blues-rock, and pulsing synths combined with distorted guitars bring a psychedelic tint to their rumbling, sinister indie-blues.
Formed after meeting at Kingswood School in Bath during the early 1990s, their debut album Fur was our first taste of their dark, urgent, visceral sound. It paved the way for a follow up in 2006, Derdang Derdang - released on Domino Records, it received strong critical acclaim, rightly earning recognition in many end of year best album polls.
Said album was recorded in Nashville in the summer of 2005 and produced by Jacquire King (Kings of Leon, Tom Waits) after an intense period of writing in South London. Yet sharing a house and spending so much time immersed in their task of writing their follow up record took its toll on the band, as Windett describes; “We went music crazy for a while. We'd get up, have a coffee and stumble straight into the room and start playing. We played for days and days and that turned into weeks and weeks.’ Pausing briefly for some sunlight, they decamped to the basement of an old farmhouse. After yet more jamming, writing and refining they had 50 mini-discs of music for consideration for their second album which was then arduously streamlined and reworked to form the record which earned them Mojo’s 5th best album of 2006, sitting higher than Cat Power and Sonic Youth in the chart.
As for the new LP, it’s a ramshackle tour de force of an album - Arp Cleveland describes their intentions as wanting “a record that was still groovy but tough, and something that could draw you in without being just a 'rock' record. We talked a lot about dada and I tried to make the lyrics have a feeling of abandonment and three or four meanings. It was important to me to write about painful things in a childlike way. The simple stuff has often taken a complex route to get there.”
Expecttions are high for the March 1st release of Coconut, the third chapter in ABO’s history. If Derdang Derdang represented a significant milestone, Pitchfork lauding their “impressive … original guiding aesthetic”, we await the next instalment with eager anticipation. They still don't make pop music, exactly, but the latest Outfit sound is more confident, exciting and approachable than ever, though in possibly the least conventional way- Sam Windett still delivers drummer Matt Cleveland’s lyrics with quivering uncertainty and desperation, and it’s this commitment to heartbreaking, fragile intensity which brings the band into their own.
TOUR DATES –
25/3/10 – The Cluny, Newcastle
26/3/10 – King Tuts, Glasgow
27/3/10 – Whelans, Dublin
28/3/10 – Academy 3, Manchester
30/3/10 – Thekla, Bristol
31/3/10 – ULU, London
NEWS –
As we hinted above, you can now download the new single ‘Shark’s Tooth’ for free in exchange for an email address at the band’s site.
It will also be released on 7” on February 22nd with an exclusive Loose Meat remix. The single is taken from the new album Coconut, released on March 1st. And we think it’s quite good.
LINKS –
VIDEOS –
SHARK’S TOOTH:
CHERRY LIPS:
DART FOR MY SWEETHEART (LIVE):