David Holmes releasing Blind On A Galloping Horse 2LP on Friday

David Holmes' new album, Blind On A Galloping Horse features an unreleased song by his late friend Andrew Weatherall.

Here's the scoop...

David Holmes has announced details of his latest recording, Blind On A Galloping Horse, due for release on Heavenly Recordings on November 10th which is his first solo album since 2008. 

A 14-track interrogation of the last decade, time spent watching a decaying, fraying Britain visibly buckling in real time while tending to his own battles with mental health. Holmes’ soundtrack to this inquiry is at times claustrophobic, often euphoric, driven by the rattle and snap of analogue drum machines, wild oscillations of droning analogue synths and the voice of Raven Violet which beguiles and commands in a way that could part oceans. 

On this record, there are songs of hope for an age of uncertainty; love songs to leap the barricades to and, on Necessary Genius, a comprehensive roll call of the great and good - those ‘dreamers, misfits, radicals, outcasts’ that we’ve lost and just a few who’ve managed to cling on in the churn of the 21st century. And there are elegiac electronics evocative of an endless Europe where pulsating, crackling rhythm tracks fuse with dreamlike textures and the underground pulse of psychedelic therapy to form something unique that feels nothing less than radical. 

Blind On A Galloping Horse was written, produced and arranged by David Holmes. The album features updated versions of the previously released singles Hope Is The Last Thing To Die and It’s Over If We Run Out Of Love and a recording of an unreleased song by Holmes’ late friend Andrew Weatherall (I Laugh Myself To Sleep). All of the album’s artwork was designed by British graphic designer Jimmy Turrell. The cover shot was taken post riot in 70’s Belfast by local cult street photographer Bill Kirk.

Get a copy of the new David Holmes release Blind On A Galloping Horse via Bandcamp right here. Listen to "Necessary Genius" and "Stop Apologizing" below. 

Andy Votel recharges with Vintage Voltage

Since B-Music bigwig and hobbyist DJ and vinyl hound Andy Votel maintained an odd degree of regularity with releases of his prior Fat City mixtapes in three year intervals – Music To Watch Girls Cry (2001), Songs In The Key Of Death (2004) and One Nation Under A Grave (2007) – there was some speculation that a new collection of obscure head-nodders might be appearing in 2010. True to form, the so-called "Saxonic wax magnet" behind the FInders Keepers reissue operation has delivered Vintage Voltage, a 68-minute dazzler of a new set which takes a sharp turn from his prior mixes. Was that a sigh of relief? Yes, well Votel's cool but sometimes corny compendiums were starting to sound a little too much like the ho-hum handiwork of soundtrack-tweaker-for-hire David Holmes.

It appears that the daily ethnic psych and freak folk concerns of running an accidental world music label like Finders Keepers has sent Votel off in the opposite direction for Vintage Voltage which is largely built on hard-thumping Euro prog, robot rock, concrete pop and whirring sound library electronic jams. All of the found sounds (never any track listings from "no-tell Votel") are obscure enough to impress his cohorts like Cherrystones, Dom Thomas, Bob Stanley and Doug Shipton while steering clear of legal hassles.
If you were hoping to hear some airy-fairy drivel sung in Welsh over lightly strummed acoustic guitars and plucked harps, I'm afraid you're out of luck. However if say, the Tafo Brothers approach to plugged-in Lollywood pop is more your steez and you don't have enough jerky Japanese electro-rock, gurgling L’Illustration Musicale and MP2000-style synth drama in your life, then you'll find Vintage Voltage positively electrifying. 

Check out these sample clips...














LINKS
Fat City Recordings http://www.fatcityrecordings.com/
Finders Keepers http://www.finderskeepersrecords.com/
Andy Votel's myspace http://www.myspace.com/andyvotel