SLOTHRUST SHARE “PLANETARIUM” TRACK | NORTH AMERICAN TOUR STARTS SEPTEMBER 14
THE PACT OUT SEPTEMBER 14 ON DANGERBIRD RECORDS
Slothrust have premiered their latest single entitled “Planetarium”. The band recently announced a run of North American tour dates this fall in support of their new LP The Pact, out 9/14 on Dangerbird Records. Prior to this single the band released the track “Birthday Cake” on COS, which was accompanied by an Origins piece. They also released their video for “Double Down” with Alternative Press and Billboard announced the new LP, plus premiered the first track from the album “Peach”. Billboard also did a sit down talk with lead singer/guitarist Leah Wellbaum who spoke at length about the album.
Slothrust is principal songwriter, guitar player and unrepentant aesthete Leah Wellbaum, with drummer Will Gorin and bassist Kyle Bann. On their fourth full-length album The Pact, Slothrust constructs a luscious, ethereal cosmos perforated with wormy portals and magic wardrobes, demonstrating more clearly than ever the band’s deft shaping of contrasting sonic elements to forge a muscular sound that’s uniquely their own.
Bizarre and mundane, tender and confident. The awkward duality of the forever outsider, rightly reclaimed as power. This is The Pact. Produced and engineered by Billy Bush in Los Angeles (the band’s new home base), Slothrust’s new album is a cerebral trip across 12 songs that oscillate between a quietly reflective tenderness and a slick, sleek confidence; balancing playful innocence with ballsy swagger. “This is the most fun I’ve ever had making a record,” Wellbaum confirms. “We were able to take risks. I’m saying yes more than no these days.”
Bush brought a rugged-lush sensibility to the proceedings, assuredly guiding the band into new territory. “I can’t say I’ve come across a band like this where every player is equally strong” Bush noted. “Typically there is one stronger talent and one that lags behind, but something I find really unique about Slothrust is that everybody really is extraordinary in their ability to discuss, understand, hear and play music.” “We had infinite possibilities with Billy at the helm,” Bann says. “Whereas in the past we strove to make a record that would accurately capture the way we sound live,” continues Gorin, “this time we explored making a studio album. We let the experience take us somewhere new.”
Photo Credit: Danny Lane
Album opener and lead single “Double Down,” commands without cawing for attention – A lurching rock song with a subversive pop hook, ripped with screeching distortion that gives way to the chorus, an irreverent, emphatically cool takedown of all doubters. “Peach” showcases Wellbaum’s penchant for quirky wordplay as it free-associates “Jack-O-Lantern, Chupacabra; Sick Menorah, Candelabra” while cascading riffs illustrate her prodigious power and inventive nuance on guitar. “You were so mean to me then but no one’s mean to me now…”
“Walk Away” introduces a slinking R&B groove and an unexpectedly sultry vocal turn by Wellbaum, whose delivery shimmers as it peaks and drops, climaxing in a pulsing, frayed guitar solo full of tension that embodies desire straining against the edges of itself. “For Robin” opens with a jaunty bass line overlaid with a 1980s hotel-wedding saxophone riff, the perfect accompaniment to a lyrical narrative that takes the form of direct address to deceased actor Robin Williams.
“The Haunting” is a sumptuous odyssey through the realm somewhere between sleeping and waking that is perhaps most indicative of The Pact’s expanded sonic palette. A twangy, acoustic strum leads the way before the bass tumbles in to hug a simple, tangy melody, conjuring a sense of underwater vertigo not dissimilar from the band’s influences like Smashing Pumpkins or the reflective wail of The Pixies. “Fever Doggs,” “a song that feels like a photograph of an old house made of dark rotting wood,” Wellbaum acknowledges, tips its hat to trailblazers like PJ Harvey as it spins toward the edge in shifting time signatures that dissolve into a furiously controlled riot.
Of the writing process, Wellbaum reflects, “I need to do it less, but I want to do it more. I don’t feel frantic anymore.” While she might argue that there’s no concrete conceptual through-line to her writing, it’s hard to ignore the ongoing conversation between her and her restless, boisterous, but ultimately unsure inner child. “When writing a lot of this material I tried to step further outside of myself and take risks I hadn’t before. After doing that, I stepped back into the role of performer and author of the material. It’s a really liberating experience.”
Tour Dates
FRI AUG 31 – San Diego, CA @ The Casbah
WED SEP 12 – Tustin, CA @ Marty’s On Newport
FRI SEP 14 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Lodge Room
SAT SEP 15 – San Francisco, CA @ Bottom of the Hill
TUES SEP 18 – Boise, ID @ – Olympic
WED SEP 19 – Spokane, WA @ The Bartlett
THU SEP 20 – Seattle, WA @ Barboza
FRI SEP 21 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
SAT SEP 22 – Bend, OR @ The Volcanic Theatre
MON SEP 24 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
THU SEP 27 – Denver, CO @ Lost Lake
SUN OCT 14 – Sacramento, CA @ Aftershock Fest
FRI OCT 19 – St. Louis, MO @ Blueberry Hill’s Duck Room
SAT OCT 20 – Kansas City, MO @ recordBar
TUE OCT 23 – Madison, WI @ High Noon Saloon
THU OCT 25 – Minneapolis, MN @ 7th Street Entry
FRI OCT 26 – Milwaukee, WI @ The Cooperage
SAT OCT 27 – Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall
SUN OCT 28 – Louisville, KY @ Zanzabar
TUE OCT 30 – Columbus, OH @ The Basement
WED OCT 31 – Indianapolis, IN @ Hi-Fi Indy
THU NOV 1 – Nashville, TN @ High Watt
FRI NOV 2 – Atlanta, GA @ Purgatory At The Masquerade
SAT NOV 3 – Asheville, NC @ The Mothlight
WED NOV 7 – Richmond, VA @ The Camel
THU NOV 8 – Washington, DC @ Rock & Roll Hotel
SAT NOV 10 – Boston, MA @ The Sinclair
SUN NOV 11 – Albany, NY @ Jupiter Hall at Lucky Strike Social
MON NOV 12 – Buffalo, NY @ Rec Room
TUE NOV 13 – Toronto, ON @ The Legendary Horseshoe Tavern
THU NOV 15 – Philadelphia, PA @ Johnny Brendas
FRI NOV 16 – Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
Slothrust
The Pact
(Dangerbird Records)
Release Date: September 14, 2018
The Pact Track Listing
01. Double Down
02. Peach
03. Planetarium
04. Walk Away
05. Birthday Cake
06. For Robin
07. The Haunting
08. New Red Pants
09. Fever Doggs
10. On My Mind
11. Some Kind of Cowgirl
12. Travel Bug
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