New Liars Al bum

anyways, go to: http://www.liarsliarsliars.com/downloads.html
there's an mp3 on there.

The album is noisy as hell and hurts to listen to in some parts. If that's your bag, go for it.

It sounds nothing like the 1st album.

A strident lack of normal movement in the anima(l) of "They Were Wrong, So We Drowned" could well prove for too agglutinous a confit, or in other words it might be excessively, nigh on wantonly, steeped in its own allegorical fattiness for greater hipster consumption. In particular as this seems now a rather pious realm, and one whose gourmandizing has, by all accounts, tended towards the lean and not-so-mean. All in the name of collegial and succour-prone peristalsis perhaps. But it is ironic then that the singer would outline a desire to be a horse on the first track, and not say an insect or something more in line with cosmopolitan solecism, when we consider as well that the one thing they possess as a band undisputedly is a certain hipster (dark) horse sense.

Of course, the first album from the Liars was a more athletic (work) horse, which, for all intents and purposes, also reached out to the aggregate and honest trendlet-bound needs of that moment. But what could be remarkable about this album is a palpable, if improbable, potential on its part to perform the same. Might be real savvy in other words, or else just about completely mystifying (to some) in its (aforementioned) seeming lack of any responsible organizational standard, even to fit with the (relatively) viable 'tortured bon vivant' meme that it represents. Not a watermark level of organization as can be often ascertained in work by their referenced fiery forbears (more or less Neubaten, Youth, Heat) -- not to mention, more recently, in such febrile avatars of transportive texture as Vibracathedral Orchestra and Sightings, to name just two.

Do (the?) Liars, here and now, demonstrate any grace in what they are doing? Perhaps sensing that the only truly publicly acceptable guess will be "yes, probably" is kind of a bold move. Surely this will oft be the case, and rampant forfeiture to the bluff will arrive too, as any anonymous negative response to the album will come across to proximate peers as simply the MORE obsequious option in/on the face of it; i.e. merely naively inimical susurration expected from those somehow perceiving themselves as not having had relented to a woefully pragmatic deadening of otherwise inherent critical faculties. Resembling a type of inversely journalistic devil's advocacy, a syndrome that has permeated the edgewise majority (I feel) will probably pick up in the record's wake, and, likewise, generally purport to be in the name of a wider, value judgment-wary cause. One that seeks, in any case, to prevent the fomenting of no-fun, zero-sum, baby-bathwater gripe meltdown scenarios, just as may be known to occur at your local record store (certainly not just this one), music magazine, weblog, et al… or at least to keep them in (small-ish) proportion.

In this they might have achieved something. Almost analogous to the films of Harmony Korine (or maybe not), it's really one for the people to decide. If you're interested, you obviously ought to listen for yourself. [DHo]

what a concept.

New Liars concept album based on "humans trying to survive in LA" due next year.

Sisterworld to be released on Mute in 2010

excited! though the producer they are working with officially Worries Me.

What's wrong with Tom Biller? (Never heard of him, BTW; I'm just curious).

i dunno...just looking at his credits...he's done stuff with Jon Brion, Beck, Kanye West, Rhett Miller, Evan Dando, Elliot Smith, Silversun Pickups, Where the Wild Things Are soundtrack

basically just strikes me as some pro nu-indie boring type slick producer i guess....

I can see where you might be coming from Matt, but the one thing I've learned being a Liars stan - don't go into any new album with preconceptions AT ALL.

yeah they are def an awesome band and have not let me down but that dudes credentials is like super boring NPR type rock to me....

i basically just hate the way "professional" rock records sound now, so i'm worried about it on just a basic engineering, mix, compression angle

Yeah, I just feel like these guys are pretty involved in how their records sound. It seems like they have been up to this point anyway. I can't see them just sitting back like all, whatever. Then again, fuck, maybe that's part of the "concept" - a super-smooth record to fit the L.A. thing. Hard to tell with these guys.

yeah i mean it's no dealbreaker, i always think they are interesting and this sounds even more interesting with the whole half-baked concept album steez....i am officially going to buy this sound unseen.

it better be a soundtrack for this

http://www.imfdb.org/images/c/c8/EscapeLA.jpg

That would be amazing.

sounds v. william gibson in conception

Thom Yorke, Bradford Cox, Suicide and Melvins on Liars Sisterworld disc two

appears to have leaked, it's on sordo

urgh file seems fucked, nevermind

basically just strikes me as some pro nu-indie boring type slick producer i guess

what did you think of the last record? that was more of a slick modern alt-rock record than this one imo

"humans trying to survive in LA" makes it sound way more sci-fi than it is

coping strategy = hanging out at The Smell, not hoarding gas and going all Mad Max

basically just strikes me as some pro nu-indie boring type slick producer i guess

what did you think of the last record? that was more of a slick modern alt-rock record than this one imo

― dmr, Thursday, January 7, 2010 9:14 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

wasn't super down with that record really..was "okay" but i guess i'm more of a they were wrong so we drowned type liars person....actually all the first three are good in their own ways

i guess i'm more of a they were wrong so we drowned type liars person

yeah me too. new one's not as good as that but I like it better than the S/T one. (that had some good songs though, "Clear Island" is badass. some of it sounded like Beck though .... nothing like that on the new one really)

The Scarecrow "Why d'you pass the bum on the street?" track is one of the best things they've ever done.

I played it on New Year's Eve. Everyone was gobsmacked. (Admittedly some of them started booing but everyone else was going bananas.)

The Scarecrow "Why d'you pass the bum on the street?" track is one of the best things they've ever done.

yeah totally! that one came on when I was on the subway on the way home from work tonight and I was rockin out, kind of has that Drowned vibe (even the title ... "Scarecrows on a Killer Slant") but with bigger guitars

i loved the s/t and i think "they were wrong" is probably my last favorite thing they've done (though it still has some jams on it). finally listening to sisterworld.

Thought the last one was a tiny disappointment after Drums, but have heard good things about the newie. Also still one of the most intense live bands around.

"Scarecrows on a Killer Slant" is AWESOME, and sounds great turned waaaaay up. Can't wait to hear a high quality version.

lol american movie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04domJ7F0oY

the end is LOL

"The Overachievers" is my new jam off this record

we drove the biocar
cuz we all loved the earth
it didn't get us far
and always sounded like a walllrussss
with ullllcerrrss

^^yesssssss

Love the album, but big WTF on the standard edition packaging? I guess they really wanted people to shell out for the deluxe. For those that haven't seen it, the disc comes in one of those cardboard sleeves that labels used to send promos in. I'm all for not having another jewel box taking up space on my shelves, but this packaging just seems way lazy.

dude, i'll second that one. seriously thought about stealing this off the internet (which i almost never do) because the standard packaging is so half-assed. paying close to $20 for the deluxe edition wasn't really an option either as i like to keep any whiffs of thom yorke and tv on the radio out of the house.

anyhow, got it cheaply enough and glad i did. it's some pretty primo liars.

oh man, i'm with you jon on the packaging. digipaks, fine. but this is almost some "if we could, we'd just hand you a loose CD" kind of shit. yeah, the cardboard sleeve is cheaper and better for the environment, but it's not that sturdy, and it almost feels like what i imagine it'd feel like to buy a hardcover that used tissue paper as a dust cover instead of actual paper.

i guess if it were an environmental thing the deluxe version would come in two cardboard cases? i wonder what the reasoning behind this was.

I ended up forking over for the deluxe package as Liars are one of the few acts I throw in with as a matter of course. Even though the last album sucked.

The new one just keeps getting better, and the bonus disc might be the first collection of remixes I've ever heard that actually coheres and sort of enhances the effect of listening to the original. The only thing I skip on it is the TV on the Radio dude w/ predictable a capella misfire, zeroing in on "dumb" lyrics and coming off just dumb.

I dunno if it tops Drum's Not Dead yet but this is really fucking good.

i wonder what the reasoning behind this was.

possibly budget? there's not a lot of $$$s in doing what liars do, wonderful though it is.

how good is this btw? being poor as poor but trying not to steal i have limited myself to 1 album purchase per month- next month its the gil scott heron and after that it is this v. the four tet album (v. anything else great that might come out between now and then v. is that knife opera thing out yet?)

yeah, the knife record came out

For the little it's worth the Liars album will be up there with LCD, Lindstrom and Christabelle and The Fall for me. It takes a while to click into place but I can't stop playing it.

^you've heard the LCD?! What's it like?

I fucking love it but it's splitting the vote with my colleagues. There's grumbling about hipster curlicues and sarky snarky New York posturing but that's always been there as far as I'm concerned.

The opening track is immense. Really awesome. And it's awesomeness gets even more awesome when you consider the fact he sounds like Kermit The Frog. Drunk Girls is a hoot and there's also a Bowie/Eno/Fripp Style song as well.

Need to get stuck into it over the weekend. I hope he reconsiders splitting up. My favourite band of the last ten years.

Sounds wicked. Is there anything like the Someone Great/All My Friends duo?

*off thread topic I know*

funny thing is that the LP comes with the two CDs (basic and remix), in their sleeves, as freebies. along with two big picture books and two thick LPs in a custom die-cut sleeve. for not much money, so i don't think production cost was a factor at all.

How do we feel about Sisterworld, now?

i respect it but i don't really like it

haha really

yeah idk liars is a band i'm going to give a pretty wide berth to in terms of executing ideas but this record is just kind of flat and unpleasant.

I think post-DND they are more of a live band, really. But they are, like, one of the most awesome live bands ever.

New song:

http://soundcloud.com/muterecords/liars-no-1-against-the-rush

Curveball (even in the wide berth of Liars curveballs) but very enjoyable. A grower.

cool that their new album is called WKIW

fucking LOVE this song, btw. listening to it for the fourth time. less a grower than an immediate, lovely and even catchy song that has absolutely no chance to be a pop hit. reminds me of the bowie/moroder "cat people"!

no takers :(

the soundcloud has gone. i really want to hear it though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yK4fxOuQMMY

cheers contenderizer. i like it well enough.

a lot of people are amazed by it. i just think it's okay.

don't seem to be a lot of folks around here amazed by it, just me. do love it though. listened to it a bunch yesterday. said it reminded me of the cat people theme, and it does, but radiohead's obviously in there too. only complaint i have is that it sort of fizzles at the end.

it's v. good imo

i saw a few people commenting on loving it on my facebook but maybe i'm just virtual friends with the right people. i'm liking it more and more as it happens.

"only complaint i have is that it sort of fizzles at the end."

yeah it seems like a track that's going to GO APE but doesn't. i'm sure that's a deliberate choice on their part, though.

i think it's great! i'm excited to hear the rest of the album, too. the recent pitchfork interview suggested that it would be heavily electronic, which sounds wonderful to me.

Who is producing WIXIW? A while back there was some kind of blog post where they dropped some cryptic remarks about some big shot producer.

Daniel Miller.

They are such a great band, I love them.

Sisterworld was great

Soundcloud is back:
http://soundcloud.com/muterecords/liars-no-1-against-the-rush

SiN Machine 3 days ago
Like David Sylvian let loose with a shit drum machine.....interesting

The album's great.

Sort of a bit new radiohead-y and a bit Mount Heart Attack-y and a bit pop.

yes plz

this is great. agree that it fizzles towards the end but ive come to realize that subtlety when it comes to electronic based music always tends to win out in the end. they could have gone for some ridic crescendo/climax and it would have sounded overdone come 5 years. the tone is what they got right here and thats all i can ask for.

I have a good feeling about this record

Love this song! I like the mix of the pretty backing track and the discordant organ bit. There's a terrifying video now also.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggR6RuBh8I0

http://www.npr.org/2012/05/27/153520354/first-listen-liars-wixiw
Halfway through, I'm enjoying what I hear. A lot.

the single and the opening track are both exactly the sound i didn't know i always wanted liars to make.

Holy crap that opener is gorgeous.

This is really really good. The first 5 tracks especially.

this is so good

Love this record, btw.

"Brats" is killer

This is one of the most horrible things I have ever heard.

Why do you say that?

To me it's just so ultimately... contemptuous-seeming and ugly. It's just an ugly slog of disparate pieces that don't mesh. It doesn't have any climactic moments. It sounds joyless and dead, and his sarcastic singing voice makes every song sound like a joke. Also, each song pretty much ends in the same place that it started.

I wanted it to be beautiful, but it managed only a clatter of signifiers of beauty.

drum's not dead still holds up imo

It's holding up a corner of my coffee table right now.

ba dum bum

I listened to this album again this morning and it's great

there are a few tracks that are kind of boilerplate liars on the WIXIW but also a few really great tracks - no. 1 against the rush and a ring on every finger are amazing

Not sure what to make of this. I'm listening to it a lot, and enjoying it, but it seems so in thrall to Kid A, Amnesiac era Radiohead at points as to almost be pastiche. One song bites Cuttooth so hard, and he sings so much like Thom so often, that I don't know if its got its tongue in its cheek.

I don't quite get a radiohead vibe off of the album, but I definitely see where you're coming from.

Sick, you asked me what I thought about this record?

(Don't know if I'm just your ~representative RH fan~ or something)

Anyway. Yeah, I can hear a Radiohead-y kind of vibe to the music, but it's more that it just seems to be doing the same kind of '00s cusp indietronica thing. There was a song that sounded exactly like an Appliance song on there as well. For the most part, I quite like the music, the instrumentation is the kind of wibble I like and the arrangements keep my attention well. (I only skipped one song! This is p good.)

BUT.

I disagree that the singer is biting Thom Yorke. If he is, I wish he would do a better job. The problem is, too many indie singers hear Thom doing that thing where he doesn't enunciate and he slurs his consonants in a rush to get to the vowels - and think that's all there is to it. So they mumble along - without realising that what makes Thom such a great singer isn't his lack of enunciation, but his ability to *emote* so that the emotional quality of his voice becomes as important if not more important than than the actual words he's singing.

The singer of this band just kind of mumbles along in a monotone and never really shows much emotion of any kind, he just comes across as lazy. Which is a shame because I actively liked the music on several songs - Octagon and Brats seemed like they could have been quite decent tunes if he'd put some effort in.

That is kind of the exact inverse of what I like about both singers! I like Yorke's voice but sometimes the delivery just seems kind of overblown and I don't quite buy the emoting! I wish the new Liars album was a bit less falsetto-heavy, though, and kind of prefer the drudgey vocal parts.

doesn't enunciate and he slurs his consonants in a rush to get to the vowels

I never noticed Thom Yorke's midwestern america accent until now :)

Didn't hear any falsetto on this album?

besides a few moments in the vocals (and that's maybe almost coincidence, i think andrew has his own thing going on that's not remotely yorke-imitation) i'm not really reminded of radiohead, it sounds more like a natural development for they were wrong so we drowned-vibe liars going more electronic. maybe a bit of a surface reading on too few listens, but the main thing i'm getting from it is something like a very sensible meeting between that era of liars and blackest ever black, demdike stare etc-type stuff, or maybe that natural development just naturally ends up there.

xxp angus andrew is australian!

iirc "Ill Valley Prodigies" and the one a couple tracks later have some falsetto

Oh. Ill Valley Prodigies was the one I ended up skipping. Oops.

I repeat, I don't think they're biting Radiohead or whatever, just operating in a similar area.

Boys mumble all over the world, it's not confined to the American Midwest or the Upper Thames Valley.

nah, I meant the vowel elongation, as we midwesterners prooonoouunce eeveery vahhoowel

There are just a handful of (maybe only 2) very specific moments where it sounds like he's singing Yorke lyrics / melodies. One where he sings something very similar to the refrain of Cuttooth - "I don't know why I feel so [something something]" and the rhythm of the delivery is very similar. There's another as well but I'd have to be listening to it to recall it.

Just now listening to this. I can take or leave Liars depending on the particular album, but I definitely approve of WIXIW.

I guess I can kind of hear the post-millenial Radioheadisms mentioned upthread, but the similarities are just on the fringes imo.

Listened to this about four times in a row yesterday whilst driving across Dartmoor. It was a beautiful day.

This isn't a beautiful album. It's crawling. It's quite desperate, and angry, but subdued. Possibly misantrhopic at points. There are some moments when light breaks through, but not many. Brats is savage. I feel like they're trying to make a point but I'm not sure what about.

Just got Sisterworld. Awesome. Really woozy, unsettling mix and arrangements, like a rock band melted. This band have clicked hard for me in the last six months.

i'm going to need to revisit sisterworld which i never really liked the first time around. but wixiw is really awesome, almost everything i want from liars.

fact magazine have a preview of a Vessel remix of one of the wixiw tracks, pretty bleak

Ha, I bought Sisterworld today too!

Seeing them on the 19th, can't wait.

http://devonrecordclub.wordpress.com/2012/10/09/liars-wixiw-round-39-nicks-choice/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf1fbu7zLII

cool.

fantastic

album is gonna be hot.

yes, more pls

That's fucking awesome.

second album trailer (featuring a different song, i think)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnb4A-Cumsc

crappy techno

oh man i love this even more than the other new song. that slicing processed-horn or synth sound is killer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9ArnXsZMHk

can't wait for this thing to be released.

full album streaming now!

this is really good.

daaaamn i want to listen to this but no time for like the next three days

i'm interviewing aaron tomorrow. looking forward to it.

i try not to listen to streams but couldn't resist. this is really good, and a nice progression from WIXIW (which I ended up loving).

this might be their weirdest album in years, which is good

i don't know if i'd throw "weirdest album" around, but this is really good -- evolution of the sounds & atmospheres first mined on WIXIW, but with a much heavier club influence. i feel like this is their true electro album...and can't wait to see what their next left-turn is, stylistically.

worked at the record store this weekend, and sold the first one to a kid who said, "this sounds like marilyn manson."

...i have not let that that ruin the record for me.

weirder than the self-titled and Wixiw, maybe? That's all I meant.

weird is one of my highest words of praise

i'll go for that :)
must've skipped over the "recent"
definitely a big tonal shift towards ambient/soundscape/drone stuff over the last third of the record

i like 'boyzone' as a song title

This isn't very good. It's probably the least memorable of all their albums. Still it gets a free pass from all the places you'd expect (Quietus, Fact, etc).

I'm not much of a depeche mode fan or of the other such programmed beat oriented groups they are imitating or mocking here, so I wonder if I should even bother (I have liked some of what they did earlier in their time together)

I've only listened to it a couple of times so far but I think this is great. I LOVE Mess On A Mission; most exciting single / song / track / whatever I've heard so far this year. They seem to have followed the course they set with Brats on WIXIW, which I'm delighted with because I loved that track.

having trouble parsing curmudgeon's post but that Mute Audio Documents comp is kind of fun and seeing Liars on Mute in that scope is kind of fun

I was referencing this from the NPR writeup:

the new album embraces the type of electro-pop that underpins the catalog of the band's parent label, Mute. Throughout the early 1980s, Mute Records built its brand on the likes of Depeche Mode, Erasure and Yaz. On songs like "Vox Turned D.E.D." and "Can't Hear Well," Andrew uses his baritone to mimic the icy intonations of these hallmark acts, the gothic synth chord changes of Hemphill and Gross following suit. "I'm No Gold" even finds Liars doing Adult.-esque electro.
Some of the Europop moves on Mess are so spot-on that one gets the feeling that Liars are taking the piss.

yeah, depeche mode of that era != depeche mode of any era since

Two albums of quite a similar aesthetic in a row is a long pisstake.

But not beyond them.

Yeah, I would say this is a palette of sounds they like, not any sort of pisstake.

I mean, unless They Were Wrong, So We Drowned was supposed to be one, too

Belatedly listening to this. It actually reminds me a bit of Shy Child, which is not something I ever thought I would say of a Liars album.

I'm sure it's from a similar synth patch, but I heard "Mask Maker" in Chipotle today

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgtISVfW2TE

and over the din it was very reminiscent of Hysterix "Talk to Me"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNSrrXjJ71Y

i completely forgot about these guys. i loved They Were Dead... and Drums Not Dead but they lost me with the s/t. listening to both of those records now for the first time in years and they're still so beautiful...

https://consequenceofsound.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/liars-tfcf.jpg?quality=80&w=806

So this band is now a solo project, Angus is the only member. Does anyone else find this odd? From the second LP on they were a solid trio. This news has kind of been buried in the press release/new album hype as well.

Someone I know was very, very bummed about the news the other day. It was the first I'd heard of it.

also what the fuck is this album called? I can't read that shit

It's TFCF which I believe stands for Theme From Crying Fountain. Pretty disappointed to see Aaron and Julian go, too - they were such a weird magical unit, especially around the DND period.

definitely one of the weirdest career/sonic arcs in indiedom

is that dickbutt on the cake or what

shit, I saw that there was new material coming but missed the fact the band's mostly disbanded :(

bummer

Wow. New record is out today and it's really, really good. Moody and groovy. It probably only compares to Liars (can't think of what it reminds me of, maybe Microphones' Mt. Eerie at times?) but this is pretty compelling.

It's growing on me. My first thought was "Yeah, this is what Liars sounds like when it's pared down to just one guy"

I'm really getting a lot out of this album still. And I love the shrieking cockatoos on the tracks, it's a sound we take for granted here but man is it frightening.