Sundaze 1838

Hello, as we'll stay longer around Bristol here at Sundaze a word on the city....

Bristol's modern economy is built on the creative media, electronics and aerospace industries, and the city-centre docks have been redeveloped as centres of heritage and culture. The city has the largest circulating community currency in the U.K.—the Bristol pound, which is pegged to the Pound sterling. The city has two universities, the University of Bristol and the University of the West of England, and a variety of artistic and sporting organisations and venues. One of the UK's most popular tourist destinations, Bristol was selected in 2009 as one of the world's top ten cities by international travel publishers Dorling Kindersley in their Eyewitness series of travel guides. The Sunday Times named it as the best city in Britain in which to live in 2014 and 2017, and Bristol also won the EU's European Green Capital Award in 2015.

The music scene is thriving and significant. In 2010, PRS for Music announced that Bristol is the 'most musical' city in the UK, based on the number of PRS members born in Bristol relative to its population. From the late 1970s onwards it was home to a crop of cultish bands combining punk, funk, dub and political consciousness, including The Pop Group, close friends of The Cortinas, who led the City's punk scene from 1976. Bristol's premier fanzine from this time through until early 1978 was Loaded. It featured all of the Bristol bands as well as those who visited the city, some of whom were promoted by the magazine.

Bristol is home to many live music venues including the 2000-seat Colston Hall, named after Colston Street and the Colston School that once occupied the site, which can attract big names, the Trinity Centre (a community-run converted Church in the Old Market area of Bristol), the O2 Academy which is part of the national touring circuit for rock bands, the Anson Rooms (part of the University of Bristol Union), the Mothers Ruin, The Thekla, Fiddler's, the Bristol Folk House, Start the Bus, the Hatchet, the Fleece, the Croft, the Cooler and the Louisiana. Plenty to go on...


Today's Artists  are an English post-rock band. They formed in Bristol, England in 1994. Core members are Kate Wright and Rachel Brook (now Rachel Coe). Brook was also a member of Flying Saucer Attack during the first few years of the band's existence, and Wright is also currently the bass player for Crescent. Other musicians have included Matt and Sam Jones (both of Crescent), Matt Elliott (The Third Eye Foundation), Chris Cole, Florence Lovegrove, Ros Walford and Clare Ring.  .....N'Joy

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Formed in Bristol, England in 1994, Movietone displayed its quiet, sensual songs on a number of releases in the mid '90s for the Planet, Domino, and Drag City labels. Band members Florence Lovegrove, Matt Elliott, Rachel Brook, Kate Wright, and Matt Jones issued two 7"s with Planet before their self-titled full-length debut came out in 1996 -- two more 7's would follow before their Drag City debut, Day and Night, in 1997. The band then went on a three-year hiatus before producing their next full-length, The Blossom Filled Streets, in the summer of 2000. Like their previous releases, The Blossom Filled Streets is gentle and complex, with a light touch that shows how much the band has grown.

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The first Movietone album came out at the height of hype and attention for Flying Saucer Attack, but what's intriguing is how clearly Rachel Brook and her compatriots readily found their own particular approach rather than simply being an extension of said band. If not yet fully achieving the stripped-down, delicate synthesis later records demonstrated, Movietone is still well on its way, as "3AM Walking Smoking Talking," with its blend of buried drums, spoken words, soft guitar, and droning clarinet shows. Acoustic arrangements take the lead more than once, and if the effect is more fragile than late-night moody as Day & Night would show, songs like "Late July" still make for an entrancing listen. "Darkness-Blue Glow," with Matt Wright's dramatic but not overly so piano parts and a hushed, reflective atmosphere is especially wonderful, easily the album's high point. Lead singer/guitarist Kate Wright has an understated voice, sometimes very hard to catch in softer moments (on "Green Ray," Florence Lovegrove's viola eventually completely obscures it). It's not the expected gentle cooing from earlier shoegaze groups, though, but more of a restrained calm à la Moe Tucker or a deeper Alison Statton. More than once, the noise kicks in -- "Orange Zero" starts out as a quiet, folkish chime before suddenly erupting into an orgy of feedback squalling, a pattern that repeats itself for the rest of the song. "Chance Is Her Opera," meanwhile, betrays a definite Spacemen 3 influence in its steady, obsessive pace, strung-out guitar, and rough but effective drums the background. The experimental home-recording roots become readily apparent more than once, whether it's the stop-start taping of the half-spoken vocal on "Heatwave Pavement" or the clattering glass and crashes on "Mono Valley," another unsettled high point and a good showcase for all the bandmembers.

Movietone - Movietone (flac  307mb)

01 Chance Is Her Opera 4:53
02 Heatwave Pavement 3:47
03 Green Ray 1:53
04 Orange Zero 4:53
05 Late July 3:35
06 Darkness-Blue Glow 5:15
07 Mono Valley 5:05
08 Coastal Lagoon 2:03
09 Alkaline Eye 5:15
10 3AM Walking Smoking Talking 3:37
11 Three Fires 1:04
bonus
12 She Smiled Mandarine Like 2:29
13 Under The 3000ft Red Ceiling 3:14
14 Orange Zero (Single) 4:52
15 Chance Is Her Opera (Demo) 4:03

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Movietone's second full album found the band specifically set on low-key performances throughout; no sudden shifts to crushing volume here, more a continued, extended dream of darkly attractive (but not dour) full-band mood-outs. Unlike, say, Mazzy Star or Low, Movietone's interpretation of smoky post-psychedelic jams relies on a definite briskness offset by Kate Wright's cool vocals, softly husked but not drowsy, combined with subtle arrangements, tweaks, and experiments to add variety. Whether it's the sudden appearance of piano leads on the opening "Sun Drawing" or the snaky cool of the rhythm on "Night of the Acacias," calling to mind a moody '60s spy movie sequence, often the simplest addition transforms each song into more than the sum of its parts. Rachel Brook's clarinet work is often the secret touch that lends the songs a little something extra or unexpected, as counterbalance to the low-feedback hyperactivity shown on "Useless Landscape." The arrangements are sometimes as stripped down as possible -- nothing but guitar, bass, and piano appears on "Noche Marina," one of the most intensely beautiful moments on a lovely album. Electricity isn't needed to carry the flow of Day & Night or a song's individual power; a buried cymbal fill or two aside, "Blank Like Snow" consists of nothing but Kate Wright and acoustic guitar, her obsessive focus suggesting a more deliberate Nick Drake circa Pink Moon. Slow solo piano, meanwhile, stands front and center on "Summer," with viola-produced drones and Matt Jones' subtle, barely there percussion creating a most unseasonal chill before a sudden uplift of gentle activity reminiscent of Talk Talk's late-period bursts takes the fore. The longest track on Day & Night concludes it, with "The Crystallization of Salt at Night" finding all the members adding just about everything (including Jones on prepared piano) to create an involving ending for a striking, unique album.
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Movietone - Day And Night  (flac 182mb)

01 Sun Drawing 3:57
02 Blank Like Snow 2:40
03 Useless Landscape 5:01
04 Summer 7:14
05 Night Of The Acacias 5:45
06 Noche Marina 4:47
07 The Crystallisation Of Salt At Night 9:47

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Introspective, delicate, and atmospheric, the music of Movietone envelops the listener like a warm bath. Vocalist Kate Wright's poetic lyrics offer up vignettes that twist themselves inextricably amongst the layers of sound, surfacing occasionally to bloom in honey tones. The richness of the band's composition and instrumentation make this music almost impossible to categorize. They use strings and prepared piano like art rock auteurs, cruise sonic landscapes like Bluetile Lounge or Galaxie 500, and the ends of their songs often tumble into extended improvisations that rival free jazz. It may be overly simplistic to say that a band called Movietone makes music that sounds like the soundtrack to melancholy film scenes under gaslight and stars, but they do make that music, and its filmic richness makes this album a most unique treat.

Movietone - The Blossom Filled Streets    (flac 178mb)

01 Hydra 4:56
02 Star Ruby 2:06
03 1930's Beach House 6:10
04 Year Ending 6:35
05 The Blossom Filled Streets 4:11
06 Porthcurno 4:46
07 Seagulls / Bass 1:53
08 In A Marine Light 5:40
09 Night In These Rooms 4:13

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The Sand and the Stars, the fourth full-length release by Bristol's Movietone, is literally a musical journey, taking the players from the beach to the city and finally ending up "on a coast path, illuminated by a lighthouse." Movietone continue with their intensely delicate music, but this time around the shimmering music seems to be more intimate, more organic, and closer to the listener in sonic space than the atmospherics of Day & Night and Blossom Filled Streets -- elements that may be due to the locations of recording. The production by Matt Jones is a bit more aggressive than Movietone's other works, but still captures that heart-wrenching quality of Movietone through the instrumentation and wonderful vocal work. Melancholy like all of their records, Kate Wright's wonderful vocals haunt against the acoustic instruments playing off one another. A communal, dark campfire vibe shines through on "Pale Tracks," where Sam Jones, Matt Jones, Kate Wright, and Rachel Coe all have vocal duties and sing with the swirling nature of the music. "We Rode On" and "Snow Is Falling" are Movietone at their best, using various instruments like clarinet, cello, banjo, bass saxophone, trumpet, double bass, drums, and guitar set against wave samples in the background, creating a chilling environment. "Near Marconi's Hut" rounds out the record, leaving the listener with a sadness that The Sand and the Stars is over and a longing for more from Movietone. The Sand and the Stars is another wonderful release from Movietone, keeping you in the imagery of a movie you saw a long time ago or a dream that you cannot shake from your memory.

Movietone - The Sand And The Stars (flac  188mb)

01 The Sand And The Stars 2:44
02 Ocean Song 5:03
03 In Mexico 5:01
04 Pale Tracks 4:06
05 Let Night In 3:52
06 We Rode On 3:49
07 Snow Is Falling 4:25
08 Not Even Close 1:48
09 Red Earth 4:08
10 Beach Samba 2:57
11 Near Marconi's Hut 1:25

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