{"title":"Full Time Hobby","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFull Time Hobby is an independent music label based in London, England. Established in 2004 by Nigel Adams and Wez Westley, the label has been a platform for showcasing diverse and talented artists from various genres. With a focus on quality music production, Full Time Hobby has gained recognition as a leading authority in the industry.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSince its inception, Full Time Hobby has consistently delivered exceptional music releases that have captivated audiences worldwide. The label's commitment to nurturing emerging talent and supporting established artists has earned them a reputation for being at the forefront of cutting-edge music.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWith *Nigel Adams* and *Wez Westley* at the helm, Full Time Hobby continues to push boundaries and explore new musical territories. Their passion for discovering unique sounds ensures that every release from the label is a testament to their unwavering dedication to artistic excellence.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"creep-on-creepin-on-1","title":"Creep On Creepin' On","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe follow-up to 2009's self-titled release, multi instrumentalists Taylor Kirk, Mika Posen and Simon Trottier come together again on heartrending compositions that engage, transport and challenge. \u003ci\u003eCreep On Creepin' On\u003c\/i\u003e moves forward from the band's eponymous album towards the realization of its ability to simultaneously invoke and disguise the most essential elements of pop and rock music with chilling authenticity. Taylor Kirk's delightfully dark vocals are both captivating and unsettling, combing vintage, smokey texture and, at times, deep guttural groans reminiscent of a Leonard Cohen vocal style.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Full Time Hobby","offers":[{"title":"LP - Smoke Clear Marble","offer_id":57689797034315,"sku":"R4539-3383","price":26.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"Clear | LP","offer_id":50383027110219,"sku":"1156572","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50383027601739,"sku":"337172","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/00e6509e-0721-4acb-be6a-f426a8e86d06_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1726262147"},{"product_id":"ghost-woman","title":"Ghost Woman","description":"\u003cp\u003eGhost Woman’s blissfully hypnotic world is the creation of melodic maniac, Evan John Uschenko. Beating the odds of life as a busy touring musician, salvaging and replacing his instruments from burned down rehearsal spaces, van break-ins and far too many relocations to list, Uschenko has transformed his lifelong habit of homespun sonic exploration into a sensory ‘mix and match’ experience destined for the main stage.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvan’s sonic and literal adventures as a touring multi-instrumentalist with songwriter \/ producer \/ guitarist Michael Rault saw him share international stages with the likes of Jacco Gardner, King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard and The Mild High Club; Who unwittingly paved the way for Ghost Woman’s inevitable incarnation.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGhost Woman’s self-titled LP brims with self-produced and self-performed Anatolian sounds and lo-fi hooks. 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Uschenko states that “the first two albums were never meant to be albums: they are like pages from diaries that have long since been burned. With the introduction of Ille van Dessel as co-writer\/drummer, the project feels like it has a direction”.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThere is a confidence and assurance that feels built upon the 2022 eponymous debut and the follow-up ‘Anne, If’, which was only released in January 2023. This urgency to progress and keep moving forward is reflected by the band: “We prefer to keep busy. But we’re lazy too. We still feel like we could be doing a lot more.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOverall, there is a darker, denser feel compared to previous releases, but the sound and vibe of this album is more akin to what the project was supposed to be when it started in 2016, finally realizing \u003cstrong\u003eGhost Woman\u003c\/strong\u003e’s creative vision.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe immersion into the album is immediate, locking in with the incessant riffing of ‘Bonehead’ setting the scene for what follows. Next up is the echoey, garage-surf twang of ‘Alright Alright’. The opening line “take a little walk with me…” has a sinister, gothic hue that wouldn’t feel out of place on \u003cem\u003eMurder Ballads\u003c\/em\u003e or \u003cem\u003ePeaky Blinders\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSonically the album holds itself together within a warm, analogue soundworld, but with few digestible vocal melodies steering the tracks or easily giving up their meaning. This is a conscious decision, with Uschenko claiming that “there is never a concept when it comes to creating something, and no intention behind anything we create, other than to make noise and complete an album”.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e‘Yoko’ reverts to chugging boogie, spitting into life in bursts of squalling guitars, and a mid-song breakdown that infers the live version will far outlive its three and a half recorded minutes. Most songs are similarly restrained in their running time, indicating a strong sense of focus and editing, rather than letting the songs run away with themselves.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOnly ‘Juan’ really breaks the five-minute mark and feels like the album’s centrepiece; an exuberant amalgamation of the themes and tones surrounding it. The title track continues this positive curve. The title is a play on the saying ‘Hindsight is 20\/20’, based on a friend’s drunken tattoo gone wrong. “Maybe it means life is all chance. Maybe it means common sense isn't so common”, say the band.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eVocals come drenched in reverb and meaning is often suggested rather than explicit. The guitars are heavier and the vocals are less easily discernible, but Uschenko believes that “vocals are not important. We prefer to not be understood. If you’re looking for meaning in these lyrics, might I suggest buying a Lenny Bruce record instead?”. Sound advice indeed, so immerse yourself in this album and tell your friends about it without the benefit of hindsight, 20\/20 or otherwise.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOverall, \u003cstrong\u003eGhost Woman\u003c\/strong\u003e appreciate that they have arrived at where they always wanted to get to: “It is the sound it was meant to be. 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When Ella Williams first visited the Dunes, she was awed by the juxtaposition of its natural splendor within the surrounding industrial corridor of Northwest Indiana. “Every time I go there, it changes my life,” she says, without a hint of hyperbole. “You stand in the marshlands and to your left is a steel factory belching fire and to your right is a nuclear power plant.” Across the water, Chicago waits, its glistening towers made possible by the same steel forged here. For as long as she’s been making music, Ella Williams’ songs have been products of the environments they’re written in, born out of the same world they so vividly hold a mirror to. This environment is where her magnetic new album, \u003ci\u003eTomorrow’s Fire\u003c\/i\u003e, lives. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe music Williams makes as Squirrel Flower has always communicated a strong sense of place. Herself-released debut EP, 2015’s early winter songs from middle america, was written during her first year living in Iowa, where the winter months make those of her hometown, Boston, seem quaint by comparison. Since that first offering, Squirrel Flower amassed a fanbase beyond the Boston DIY scene with several releases. The most recent, Planet (i), was informed by climate anxiety, while the subsequent Planet EP marked an important turning point in Williams’ prolific career; the collection of demos was the first self-produced material she’d released in some time. With a renewed confidence as a producer, she helmed \u003ci\u003eTomorrow’s Fire \u003c\/i\u003eat Drop of Sun Studios in Asheville alongside storied engineer Alex Farrar (Wednesday, Indigo de Souza, Snail Mail). Working tirelessly through long studio sessions with no days off, Williams and Farrar tracked many of the instruments, building the songs together during the first week, and then assembled a studio band that included Matt McCaughan (Bon Iver), Seth Kauffman (Angel Olsen band), Jake Lenderman (aka MJ Lenderman),and Dave Hartley (The War on Drugs) lending their contributions. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile her early work is often hushed and minimal, there has always been a barely contained storm in Williams’ music. \u003ci\u003eTomorrow’s Fire\u003c\/i\u003e is that storm breaking open, a rock record, made to be played loud. As if to signal this shift, the album opens with the soaring “i don’t use a trash can,” a re-imagining of the first ever Squirrel Flower song. Here, she nods to those early shows, when her voice, looped and minimalistic,had the power to silence a room. Lead singles “Full Time Job” and “When a Plant is Dying,” narrate the universal desperation that comes with living as an artist and pushing up against a world where that’s a challenging thing to be. The frustration in Williams’ lyrics is echoed by the music’s uninhibited, ferocious production. “There must be more to life\/ Than being on time,” she sings on the latter’s towering chorus. Lyrics like that one are fated to become anthemic, and Tomorrow’s Fire overflows with them. “Doing my best is a full time job\/ But it doesn’t pay the rent” Williams sings on “Full Time Job” over careening feedback, her steady delivery imposing order over a song that is, at its heart, about a loss of control. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album glides effortlessly over emotional states of being, lightness and heaviness. “Intheskatepark,”written in the summer of 2019, four years later sounds like a dispatch from a bygone world. The scuzzypop production nods to Guided By Voices, as Williams sings about crushing under summer sunshine. “I had a light,” Williams repeats mournfully on “Stick,” her voice at once aching and powerful, a sense of rage fermenting as the song goes on, until it explodes in the second half. “This song is about not wanting to compromise, just being at the end of your rope,” Williams says. “Stick” harnesses that exasperation and turns it into a battle cry for anyone who is exhausted but feels like they’re not working hard enough,who had to get a job they hate to make rent, who lost their light and can’t seem to find it again. Finding that light is important. “I feel like I lost myself for a bit”, Williams says, “trying hard to be what I thought people wanted me to be, suffocated by the pressure of being perceived. Now, I want to be unapologetic, uncompromising.’ Role models like Kim Gordon, Patti Smith, and PJ Harvey, alongside inspiration from contemporaries and friends led Williams to the most uncompromising version of her music. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWilliams also cites artists like Jason Molina, Tom Waits, and Springsteen as fonts of inspiration for \u003ci\u003eTomorrow’s Fire,\u003c\/i\u003e musicians who knew how to write into the mind of a stranger, who could tell you the story of a life in under four minutes. “The songs I write are not always autobiographical, but they’re always true,” Williams says. Nowhere is Springsteen heard more clearly than on “Alley Light,” an electrifying song narrated from the perspective of a down-on-his-luck guy whose car is fated to die anyday now and whose girl just wants to escape. There’s a vintage sheen to it, but “Alley Light” captures the very familiar feelings of loss that come with living in a 21st century city, where you blink and the store fronts change. Williams notes, ‘It’s about a man in me, or a man who I love, or even a man who is a stranger to me.’ \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSpringsteen also leads back to one the strongest recurring themes for Williams both on this album and throughout her career, family. With her musical family members often playing on previous records,‘Canyon’ tells the story of Williams’ mother. As a teen, sneaking out to go to a Springsteen concert with her boyfriend. “She was a rebel,” Williams says, “I always learn more about myself through stories of her life and I wanted to honor that”. The biggest her sound has ever been, ‘Canyon’ echoes like rocks fallingfrom cliffs, breaking apart. The vast natural landscape meeting industrialism–field recordings of metal grinding taken by her sibling at their job as a steelworker layered with the wall of guitar. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eTomorrow’s Fire\u003c\/i\u003e might sound like the title of an apocalypse album, but it’s not. It references the title of a novel Williams’ great-grandfather Jay wrote about a troubadour, named for a line by the Medieval Frenchpoet Rutebeuf, a troubadour himself: “Tomorrow’s hopes provide my dinner \/ Tomorrow’s fire must warm tonight.” Centuries on, the quote spoke to Williams, who describes the fire as a tool to wield in the face of nihilism. Tomorrow’s Fire is what we take solace in, what we know will make us feel okay in the morning, how we light the path we’re walking on.“We may have to try a little harder every year to be playful, to shove away the bitterness” Williams says of the lessons learned from her ancestor, “but it’s always worth it to remain playful and hopeful, even if the stakes are really fucking high”. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eClosing track ‘Finally Rain’ speaks to the ambiguity of being a young person staring down climate catastrophe. The last verse is an homage to her relationship with her loved ones - ‘We won’t grow up.’ A stark realization, but also a manifesto. 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That’s in addition to making up half of acclaimed, primarily instrumental space-country duo “Steelism.” Clearly he’s had little trouble fitting in since moving from his native London to Music City by way of Detroit eight years ago, even if it’s mostly meant blending into the background. “I guess I’ve always hidden behind [the instrument],” he deadpans. “I’m always the guy who looks like he’s studying for a test in the background.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNow, with a debut solo album, \u003ci\u003eSpencer Cullum’s Coin Collection\u003c\/i\u003e, paying homage to the ’60s and ‘70s psych-pop, folk and proto prog heroes of his homeland, this Nashville sideman’s stepping out from the shadows into the spotlight. 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And that's not just because songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Evan Uschenko is deeply steeped in classic guitar-led rock and pop songwriting (more on that later), it's that the music was, by design, intended to be evocative. But not evocative, however, of any one thing; what separates the music of Ghost Woman from a great many other bands working today is his openness to non-specificity. 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Though some songs seem to almost directly reference certain bands and eras of rock music, none of it is ever pure imitation; Uschenko's melodic sense – at once detached (in a Pavement kind of way) and yearning (the winsome melodies and harmonies of Crosby, Stills, and Nash are summoned more than once) – glues the album together. Spot-on late-60s-style drum fills on title track could be lifted from any number of tracks on the Nuggets compilation; “Street Meet” betrays an interest in the endless horizon feel of bands like Can and Neu!, and the chiming 12-string guitar sounds pervading the album (see “The End of A Gun”) would be right at home on classic sides by The Byrds, Love, and Jefferson Airplane.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe warm, straightforward production – which recalls Safe As Milk-era Captain Beefheart, the first couple Beak albums, or Shel Talmy's 60s productions for The Creation or The Kinks – also knits the whole thing together, and its perfectly tape-saturated, analog sound offers a pleasing counterpoint to today's world of digital recording, plugin effects, and “we'll fix it in post” attitudes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUschenko eschews the notion that the band is – at least entirely – a “solo project”, as Ghost Woman's live show is very much a band-centric affair, these days comprised of creative and romantic partner Ille van Dessel (Poolface) at the drums, and longtime hometown co-conspirator Nick Hay handling whatever string-related duties need attending to. 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The autumnal hymnal of ‘Lisa’ meanwhile, was one of the first, more fictional tracks written for the record, from the viewpoint of the sea, watching the protagonist pass by day after day, offering a metaphorical reflection on the natural world around us. “We don’t realize we are surrounded by all this beauty; we’re shut up inside, rushing to get to work, buying books online without ever leaving home. 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The title came first to her as a joke: it’s her made-up name for the new planet people will inevitably settle and destroy after leaving Earth, as well as the universe imagined within her music. The record is a love letter to disaster in every form imaginable - these songs fully embrace a planet in ruin. Buoyed by her steadfast vision and propelled by her burning comet of a voice, \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e is at once a refuge, an act of self-healing, and a musical reflection of Squirrel Flower’s inner and outer worlds. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWilliams wrote most of the songs on Planet (i) before the COVID-19 pandemic, but disaster looms large in its DNA. Susceptible to head injuries having played a lot of sports in her youth, Williams received three concussions from 2019-2020. Amidst the chaos of touring internationally during her own healing process, she began weaving threads between her physical and personal sense of ruin and her lifelong fear of the elements: of being swept up by storms, floods, and the deep ocean. \"To overcome my fear of disasters\", Williams says, \"I had to embody them, to stare them down\". This journey of decay and healing is the lifeblood of \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e. Once quarantine set in, Williams began to produce demos in her room, amassing a collection of more than 30 recordings. Feeling a sense of artistic synchronicity over international phone calls with producer Ali Chant (PJ Harvey, Perfume Genius), and with newfound covid antibodies, Williams flew to Bristol, UK in the fall of 2020 to record \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e at Chant’s studio, The Playpen. \"We had this shared creative language\", she recalls, \"and the recording process was, like my demo process, very sculptural. Instead of recording live with a full band, we built this record layer by layer, experimenting, taking risks\". \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile Williams and Chant played most of the instruments on the record, Bristol drummer Matt Brown and Portishead’s Adrian Utley also joined their sessions. When Chant suggested the idea of backup vocals, Williams, whose voice had until now stood alone in her songs, enthusiastically enlisted friends and family to join her remotely with their voices and instruments; Tenci’s Jess Shoman, Tomberlin, Katy J. Pearson, Jemima Coulter, Brooke Bentham, and her brothers Nate and Jameson Williams, as well as her father Jesse. The songs on \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e are Squirrel Flower’s instruments for connection: with the people in her life, her collaborators, audiences, and ancestors; a lineage of artists whose spirits continue to inform her art. At the heart of this record is an insistence on connection and healing in the face of catastrophe. On \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e, Squirrel Flower reveals a bright and uncompromising vision, confident in her powers of self-healing and growth. No matter what the disaster ahead of or within her looks like, and no matter how she shape-shifts to meet it, Squirrel Flower will always be a world of her own, a space-rock flying down the road in flames and flat tires.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLP++ and Book - 42-page, full-colour, perfect bound book chronicling the photos, handwritten notes and drafts of lyrics which emerged during the creation of Squirrel Flower's sophomore album \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e. All the notes and photos are taken from Ella's notebooks or private collection of photographs, providing an intimate and honest insight into Ella's creative process. 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Other reference points for the record included Neil Young, Weyes Blood and - on ‘Wear My Medals’ in particular - Bradford Cox and Cate Le Bon’s collaborative record Myths 004.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhere \u003ci\u003eFad \u003c\/i\u003efound Silverbacks focused on recapturing the live experience rather than reveling in studio experimentation, \u003ci\u003eArchive Material\u003c\/i\u003e skillfully traverses the line between the two. As a unit, they replicate that irrepressible live energy via complex arrangements incorporating everything from wistful Rhodes (‘Carshade’) to congas and Gang Of Four-style bass (‘Different Kind Of Holiday’)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eKeenly observed and vividly rendered, Archive Material is an eye-witness account of human resilience as much as it is a compelling indie-rock record. 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Nearly five years after their last lightning-tinted volley, the magisterial Montreal psych-rock band have sworn off compromise, split with their long-standing label, and completed a searing, 72-minute suite about the darkness of dying and the light on the other side. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Besnard Lakes Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings\u003c\/i\u003e is the group's sixth album and the first in more than 15 years to be released away from a certain midwestern American indie record company. After 2016's \u003ci\u003eA Coliseum Complex Museum\u003c\/i\u003e - which saw Jace Lasek and Olga Goreas attempting shorter, less sprawling songs - the Besnards and their label decided it was time to go their separate ways; with that decision came a question of whether to even continue the project at all. What use is a band with an instinct for long, tectonic tunes - rock songs with chthonic heft and ethereal grace, five or 10 or 18 minutes long? 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At last the Besnard Lakes have crafted a continuous long-form suite: nine tracks that could be listened together as one, like Spiritualized's \u003ci\u003eLazer Guided Melodies\u003c\/i\u003e or even \u003ci\u003eDark Side of the Moon\u003c\/i\u003e, overflowing with melody and harmony, drone and dazzle, the group's own unique weather. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHere now, the Besnard Lakes finally dispensed with the two\/three-year album cycle, taking all the time they needed to conceive, compose, record and mix their opus. Some of its songs were old, resurrected from demos cast aside years ago. Others were literally wood shedded in the cabanon behind Lasek and Goreas's \u003ci\u003eRigaud Ranch\u003c\/i\u003e - invented and reinvented, relishing this rougher sound. 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Also imperative was to manipulate the social conditions in which the takes were performed and nail the ‘vibe’ during recording: “It was all \u003ci\u003e“attitude towards life and esoteric stuff, natural law, how energy transfers, sounds, chemistry between people”\u003c\/i\u003e, explains van Bakel, \u003ci\u003e“trying to foster an environment together where we can make some magic, capture the phenomena of energy and soundwaves interacting with each other in the room. And that was definitely what we wanted it to sound like - pro human”\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn many ways,\u003ci\u003e “pro-human”\u003c\/i\u003e captures the radical quintessence that \u003ci\u003eWhy Is the Colour of the Sky? \u003c\/i\u003eis fulsomely jazz-shuffling towards. For a record that recognises, in it’s every breath and sinew  the humbling, restorative and life-affirming power of collective creative endeavour - it’s also a work that resists an ever more technologically-driven and isolating world that can feel ever more dehumanising in its quests for ‘perfection’. A theme directly addressed in  ‘Children of the Man’ with it’s “Robo-sapien” lyric, it’s a thread that runs across the entire record:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e“I feel like a lot of human nature and tradition is worth preserving because we've probably evolved to be this way.”\u003c\/i\u003e, van Bakel notes, “\u003ci\u003e[Why is the Colour…] is all just about not losing your head and being over stimulated by the ‘goggle box’; the need for spirituality and nature; the need to be able to communicate and share ideas and adapt in a rapidly changing world without being judged and profiled. The preservation of human needs, so we don't all get homogenised and isolated and poisoned to stupidity and obedience. \u003c\/i\u003e“ \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAnd what better way is there to feel human than by laying down a dynamite groove, or nine?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Full Time Hobby","offers":[{"title":"Red LP","offer_id":50531207545163,"sku":"2218847","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50531207348555,"sku":"2218846","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/WHY2_3bcdb54f_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1728098712"},{"product_id":"love-you-all-over-again","title":"Love You All Over Again","description":"\u003cp\u003eTime flies when you’re being Tunng. Can it really be over two decades since the band’s genre-blurring, self-styled ‘pagan folktronica’ first emerged from an east London studio courtesy of a clutch of Gilles Peterson-endorsed singles on the small but perfectly formed Static Caravan imprint? It surely can, and what’s more, January 2025 will mark the twentieth anniversary of \u003ci\u003eThis is Tunng...\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eMother’s Daughter and Other Songs\u003c\/i\u003e, a debut long player whose acoustic guitars and poetic disquisitions on nature, mythology and the human condition, courtesy of Sam Genders, sieved through fellow band founder Mike Lindsay’s lattice of fractured beats and crackling electronics, still sounds like an impiously postmodern wedding of the rustic and the synthetic, the arcane and the futurist – one for which the designation ‘pagan folktronica’ is as good a shorthand as any. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhichever way we choose to describe it, that 20-year-old signature sound makes a warm return on Tunng’s eighth studio album, \u003ci\u003eLove You All Over Again\u003c\/i\u003e, a winning amalgam of texture and melody, disconcerting imagery and shapeshifting production, predicated, Lindsay reveals, on a conscious reacquainting with the band’s first principles.  “I went back to the first two albums just to listen to how we fused genres – things like Davy Graham, Pentangle and the \u003ci\u003eWicker Man\u003c\/i\u003e soundtrack, all of which I was discovering back then, together with Expanding Records [the Shoreditch-based repository of soi-disant ‘beautiful electronic music’], whose studio space we shared. That was all going into the early records. Over the years, Tunng’s sound has varied and twisted, but at the root there is always a flavour of what Sam and I made on that first album. Rather than searching for a new avenue we went back to what we used to do, which, after all this time, felt like it \u003ci\u003ewas \u003c\/i\u003ea new avenue... \u003ci\u003eLove You All Over Again\u003c\/i\u003e is our way of coming full circle.” \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAnd what a circle it’s been, one that has embraced global touring, chart-grazing singles (like live favourites ‘Jenny Again’ from 2006, the following year’s ‘Bullets’ and  2010’s ‘Hustle’), a jaw-dropping live collaboration with Tuareg desert blues combo Tinariwen (including two memorable Glastonbury performances in 2009 and 2010), and a catalogue of restlessly innovative albums for the Full Time Hobby label, beginning with folktronica exemplars \u003ci\u003eComments of the Inner Chorus\u003c\/i\u003e in 2006\u003ci\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eGood Arrows \u003c\/i\u003ein 2007. Subsequent longplayers would expand the Tunng palette, exploring more of a live band feel and embracing broader leftfield pop and psychedelic flavours, helping cement widespread acclaim and a loyal international audience in the process.  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn between albums and tours, Tunng’s founders would work away from the band’s fold – Lindsay notably in his Cheek Mountain Thief solo guise and later in LUMP, a keening collaboration with folk imperatrix Laura Marling, while Genders absented himself from a brace of Tunng albums – 2010’s... \u003ci\u003eAnd Then We Saw Land\u003c\/i\u003e and 2013’s \u003ci\u003eTurbines –\u003c\/i\u003e to work on collaborative songwriting projects and on his critically lauded modern pop vehicle, Diagrams. The core duo would be firmly back in harness on the band’s sixth album, however, 2018’s electronica-heavy, tour-de-force \u003ci\u003eSongs You Make At Night\u003c\/i\u003e, and again for 2020’s ambitious and ingenious \u003ci\u003eDead Club\u003c\/i\u003e.  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIf the latter – a an often droll, \u003ci\u003elitterateur\u003c\/i\u003e and philosopher-enhanced meditation on mortality, grief and loss, accompanied by an engrossing podcast series – inevitably had its moments of gravity, then \u003ci\u003eLove You All Over Again \u003c\/i\u003eis, in many ways, a buoyant, celebratory rejoinder. A collection of spirited, mellifluous if ever-so-lightly eerie songs, it’s an album that, according to chief lyric writer Genders, reflects a sunnier latter-day disposition. “I’ve always been interested in the contrast between the pain and darkness of life on one hand and its magic and wonder on the other. These days, I guess I’m more drawn to the latter... Lyrically, it was very much stream of consciousness, and the songs have a lot of recurring themes: taking solace in nature, people, connections and the way life can be confusing and painful and so incredibly beautiful all at the same time.”  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album began to take shape after an August 2023 Tunng appearance at Sicily’s Festivalle festival, the band’s first live performance since 2018 (“it was a one-off we couldn’t turn down”, they admit, cryptically, which sounds very Sicilian...) and was assembled over the following 12 months “in our usual jigsaw-puzzle way” at Lindsay’s Margate studio, with significant contributions from all six band members – vocalist Becky Jacobs, guitarist Ashley Bates, percussionist\/woodwind player Martin Smith (“the \u003ci\u003ereal \u003c\/i\u003emusician in the band” Lindsay observes, dryly) and keyboardist Phil Winter, all now long-established foils to the Mike\/Sam axis. “The recording process actually started with me and Phil”, Lindsay recalls. “Then Sam arrived and brought the incredible fantasy song-ness. Then Martin came with percussion, clarinets and other flavours and Becky with her Becky tones. Ash was constantly sending me guitar, banjo and saw parts from his Somerset studio...”  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOver time, the various in-studio permutations and shared files would cohere into a recognisable if reinvigorated Tunng sound world. Genders, long resident in Sweden, was only able to make a brief visit to the Margate studio and while in the past Tunng recordings were often developed from his songwriting blueprints, this time, things worked collaboratively and collectively from the outset. “I did send some completed songs to Mike early on, although I wasn’t sure we’d ever actually work on them – I just wanted to get the process going”, he reveals. “There were a couple that could have gone on the album, and we all discussed them, but they were essentially pop songs, and this isn’t a pop album.” Subsequently working together more spontaneously, Lindsay remains agog at the speed with which his partner could summon a narrative. “I would present Sam with just a sliver of music, and he’d come back with a complete lyric within an hour. All the things that were going on in his mind manifested immediately in these slightly nursery rhyme-like songs of ‘hopeful creepiness’... The stuff seemed to pour out of him, just like it always did.” A typically understated Genders concurs. “I was in the studio for four days and I think we wrote seven songs, all of which are on the record, which is pretty unusual...”  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile \u003ci\u003eLove You All Over Again\u003c\/i\u003e represents a considered, if free-flowing return to Tunng’s stylistic and aesthetic rudiments, it is also a reflection of the magical cohesion the band have come to realise over time, particularly on stage. “There’s a bizarre chemistry between us”, affirms Becky Jacobs, “which is quite extraordinary given that we’re all very different – especially now that we’ve got kids and live in different parts of the world. And our tastes in music are quite diverse, even if there are things that overlap. Tunng has always been about Mike and Sam at the centre, but there’s something about the six of us – it just works.” Genders agrees. “Chemistry is not just about the individual abilities of the people involved; it’s about facilitating ideas. We always bounce off each other – there are some Herculean email chains... Tunng has always been eclectic; it’s Mike’s production that makes everything coherent.”  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhether it’s that ineffable esprit de corps, the meticulous studio craft or simply a turn of the karmic wheel, \u003ci\u003eLove You All Over Again\u003c\/i\u003e, with its folk-hymnal intimacy, its glimmering lights and long shadows, its unforced fusion of soul and machine, feels like a Tunng album for today – something of a familiar comfort in uncertain times and, equally, a record for the ages. While, as Genders contents, this is not a pop album per se, it is, nonetheless, as melodically generous and lyrically bewitching as it is eccentric and startling, and in its highly detailed, genre-melding production, and in the preternaturally timeless, reverb-less blend of Genders’ and Jacobs’ voices (sporadically joined by Lindsay and the rest of the ensemble’s distinctive shanty choir), as captivating as anything in the band’s considerable canon. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Full Time Hobby","offers":[{"title":"LP - Red","offer_id":50542237974859,"sku":"2226671","price":26.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50542230274379,"sku":"2226670","price":11.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP - Clear","offer_id":51295312511307,"sku":"R7440-5869","price":26.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/cAyiwl_V_5d80a7cf_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1728297778"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/collections\/test_c652366d_thumbnail_4096_2e626d2c-9fa1-4cdc-a262-f8e72fbbc6b5.jpg?v=1726262114","url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/de\/collections\/full-time-hobby.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}