by
Rob Jones
IMPERIAL WAX SHARE A BRAND NEW VIDEO FOR THE NEW SINGLE “BROMIDIC THRILLS“
BAND ARE TOURING THEIR DEBUT ALBUM GASTWERK SABOTEURS THIS OCTOBER/NOVEMBER
Imperial Wax proffer otherworldly primal noise rock that’s both animalistic and shamanistic, like a coyote, its mouth frothing from peyote, has drifted from the high plains in order to prowl the Pennines.
Following the release of their debut album, Gastwerk Saboteurs earlier this year the four-piece, which includes three 11 year veterans in the longest serving and last line up of The Fall, share a brand new single on Louder Than War Records UK (DL/LP formats) and Saustex for North America (limited LP format only) coinciding with tour dates – see below. A new follow-up album is also expected in 2020.
Oxymoronic by name, demonic by nature, there’s nothing platitudinous about the heinously noisy but insidiously hooky rocking and rollocking of “Bromidic Thrills.” Meanwhile the B-Side “Bloom & Wither” is not so much a shrinking violent as inherently violent, dripping with barely restrained malevolence and murderously melodic intention ending with fully-flanged explosive bombast.
About the new single, vocalist and guitarist Sam Curran remarks…”Bromidic Thrills is a pure release of frustration that was written very quickly and initially void of being attached to any sort of tune or song, just a pure vent about a multitude of negative factors. Mainly myself, my choices, where I live, what I want to do with my life and who I want to do it with. Contradictory desires locking horns. Feeling anchored. Peering over the walls I’ve built around myself and the walls that living in a small town built for me. Thwarting my own future with complacency and slipping into a casual state of mind.”
Drummer Keiron Melling continues…
“We wanted to try a different production technique and capture a more raw live feel for this recording. We picked Greenmount Studio in Leeds because we liked the idea of recording to tape and they have a nice gear selection. ‘Bloom & Wither’ was done in the first take with vocal and trumpet overdubs. The idea was to make it a song of two halves, with the front half sounding like a rockabilly/cowboy car chase, and the second half sounding like you just fell out of a pub after a lock-in. We invited Jack Davis along from Mansion Of Snakes, after seeing their set at Long Division Festival and thinking it would work well with the tracks. He nailed the sound we were after so we decided to have trumpet on the single ‘Bromidic Thrills’ again, with the same live approach with only vocal and trumpet overdubs. I get a kick out of the speed recording approach because it doesn’t give you time to agonise over the slight imperfections like I think really adds the character to the whole feel.”
IMPERIAL WAX LIVE DATES:
Friday 25th October – Berlin, Germany, Kantine am Berghain
Saturday 26th October – Amsterdam, Netherlands, London Calling (Paradiso)
Wednesday 6th November – Dublin, Ireland, The Sound House
Thursday 7th November – Limerick, Ireland, Kasbah Social Club
Friday 8th November – Galway, Ireland, Roisin Dubh
Saturday 9th November – Belfast, Ireland, Speakeasy
Thursday 21st November – Southampton, Joiners
Friday 22nd November – Milton Keynes, The Craufurd
Monday 25th November – Sheffield, The Leadmilll
Tuesday 26th November – Stafford, Redrum
Wednesday 27th November – Leicester, The Cookie
Thursday 28th November – Edinburgh, Sneaky Pete’s
Saturday 30th November – Preston, The Ferret
Gastwerk Saboteurs delivers twelve memorable songs showcasing their distinctly vital and infectious blend of post-punk, rock ‘n’ roll and garage rock.
The album was released via Saustex Records this May, and produced by Mat Arnold (Noisettes, The Coral, Peter Gabriel, The Fall) Ex in-house engineer at Real World Studios. Mastered by award winning mastering engineer Andy Pearce who has remastered works for (Elvis Presley, Motörhead, Black Sabbath, Frank Sinatra, Lou Reed, Bo Diddley, X-Ray Specs, The Kinks).
“Imperial Wax are noise rock & garage brawlers unafraid of a psych workout or a rockabilly dust-up.” – Velvet Sheep
“Put lessons learned of speed, brawn, twang and sludge into effect with relentless transmissions of anger, frustration and other volatile states…MES would approve.”
– 4* MOJO review
“A collection of gritty garage rock, rockabilly and indie flavours with plenty of heft…Set opener “The Art Of Projection” is followed by the razor-sharp soundtrack to a pub brawl, “Saying Nothing”, the Brexit Britain anthem of “Barely Getting By” and a host of treasures…Imperial Wax is a band with fire in their bellies.” – 4* i-newspaper
“Thankfully Curran’s vocal style contains no MES references, and the music is similarly evolved, providing a sludgy rock undertow to tracks like “Turncoat” or knocking out some bubblegum garage for “Plant The Seed”. There are also a couple of longer tracks…that channel The Stooges to great effect.” – UNCUT
“Crunching noise rock with a muscular post-rock sensibility, the album wipes the floor with sundry much younger and much more hyped contemporaries.” – Clash
“Marked by its aggressive stamp and squalling groove, this band have enough fire in their bellies to suggest that Gastwerk Saboteurs is no end of career cash-in and that there’ll be plenty more fine sounds to come yet.” – 4* The Arts Desk
“There’s slightly offset guitars, jerky abrasive drums and an underlining bass judder that shifts, backtracks and moves awkwardly throughout this record. There’s a raw power that sounds like the band trying to escape from a nailed shut wooden crate. It feels like they have made music together forever, it’s as tight an airlock. But over the top of that the vocals bring everything together and make this record massive.” – Fighting Boredom
