Wire - Red Barked Tree

New album coming from the Wire lads!

Red Barked Tree (pf18)

During 2010 Wire has been working on its 12th studio album which is being mastered as we speak. The album was recorded in London, and all of the material was composed during 2010.

The release dates will be

20th December 2010 - Digital
10th Jan 2011 - CD (Vinyl will be released either with or ahead of the CD)

The provisional running order is

Please Take
A Flat Tent
Adapt
Two Minutes
Clay
Bad Worn Thing
Moreover
Now Was
Smash
Down To This
Red Barked Trees

Some titles will be familiar from shows earlier in the year. More info will be forthcoming over this year.

well here we go then

Leaked! And it's damn good on first listen, which means it's only going to get better. I pre-ordered it from their site to get the bonus EP and will be at the gig in the spring.

this is great, from one listen it was more involving that the previous one.

i've heard those two chords before tho

And they're the best chords ever!

it's definitely less abrasive than the recent stuff. very nice.

Red Barked Tree streaming in its entirety at NPR.

Listening to bits of this on youtube. Its really effing good.

And I'm seeing them tonight! Woo.

If you tell Colin he's sexy he'll get embarrassed!

Umm, or so I'm told...

Bahaha :D

let me know how the show is-- i'm trying to decide whether to catch them in austin tx on this tour

Shall do! I'll try and get some shots/footage as well.

They're on really, really good form at the moment (apart from the fact Colin doesn't know any of the lyrics yet). Really worth watching.

oh wow that was a fucking awesome gig.

They played "Kidney Bingoes", "Drill", "Red Barked Tree", "Nice Streets Above" (I think? Is that the rly short one that stops suddenly?), i should have paid more attention but I was having too much fun also I got video which I will u/l soon.

Here is the video I got of Wire last night. Cut the start off the song, oops. But it came out pretty ok.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yOVxmYMdl4&

Oh they also played "Two People in a Room" which was awesome and the crowd went nuts.

Am I the only one who finds the lyrics to Please Take bad. Like to the point where I'm having trouble listening to an otherwise very Wire-y song. I've been fine w/like 99% of what they've done to date, but for whatever reason the whole take your knife out of my back, fuck off thing is really grating.

I chalk it up to Graham being Graham. It's sort of a counterpoint to "One Of Us" from "Object 47", but with much more bile.

Yeah, One Of Us (one of my favorite songs of theirs, period) is nice. Please Take kind of jumps from the vague hostility of that to something a little too blunt. And by blunt, I mean the kind of lyrics that a thirteen-year-old might come up with. Frustrating, as I like the basic song (although it is a bit pop-wire-by-numbers).

Heh I've generally liked the Lewis stuff least because lyrical style seemed not to fit voice/delivery, so I *do* really like Please Take for sounding like what Lewis has actually been saying all the time! Plus, those beautiful chords.

Just dawned on me it's been *over 20 years* since I saw Wire (and then they were sorta "those guys from the past who came back" haha) -- and then I remember Lewis had this strange contraption on his bass: a sort of module that slid along the body of the instrument, which he pushed back and forth probably to make some noises or something. What the hell was that about? Anyone else see them um 1987-89? This is v hard to look up on youtube...

It was for when they did "Crazy Horses"

I love thast "fuck off out of my face" chorus in "please take"! its refreshingly direct for them for once.

Yeah, I may just have waited for a proper "fuck off" from the Lewis.

Discovered this is up on emusic. Got excited. Went to dl it. Not available in yr country at this time oops sorry lol!

Fuck u emusic >:|

friend played this in his bar last night, not bad at all.

Who else got the 4 track "Strays" bonus EP? Goddamn the new version of "Boiling Boy" is crazy good.

Wire is my Beatles.

i got tha ep, too. haven't heard it in a couple weeks now, but it's pretty strong. and it's nice to have it separated from RBT as it's quite different sounding

Your handle is outdoor_miner and this is the first you've chimed in on this thread? Thoughts on RBT itself?

RBT still not available on emusic in aus. grrrrr.

'Smash' is brilliant.

Is 'Please Take' the first swear since 'Mr. Suit'?

Got the EP, going to give it a listen now.

Is 'Please Take' the first swear since 'Mr. Suit'?

Really? There's at least one other song on RBT where Colin swears.

Vinyl buyers beware. My RBT lp sounded as if it was covered in a thin layer of felt, especially side 2. Unlistenable. I contacted the folks at Pink Flag and they mentioned something about having some "issues" with the pressing. No kidding.

The folks at Other Music (where I bought it) were totally understanding and are offering up store credit. Not sure when there will be properly done vinyl.

Red Barked Tree Felt Barked LP

saw Wire on saturday, they were awesome. The songs from Red Barked Tree were noisier live than on the album, which suited them particularly well, especially Moreover, which was incredible. They ended the with a really noisy and great version of Pink Flag.

NICE- i am seeing them this Friday in ATX

I really like the way this album is produced. At least as it sounds on youtube.

but they are repeating themselves

good or bad?

I don't see it as repeating, I see it as I integrating the best bits from all their phases. Acoustic guitars, for example, are (mostly) new.

I saw them in Boston last night. Hella show despite a couple of meatheads who decided to slam despite NO ONE ELSE who wanted to. Wtf? Anyway, we had a cool almost mellow version of "Drill" and lots of other surprises like "Map Ref".

Yeah it doesn't have that eerie feeling you get when bands sound too much like themselves. Really looking forward to the SF show.

Oh man, that show was so good! All kinds of awesome mid-80s stuff turned up (Silk Skin Paws, Boiling Boy, Kidney Bingos, Advantage in Height, Drill), and the songs from the new album sounded fantastic.

I think the album's pretty good; "Moreover" is my favorite.

I was somewhat disappointed by the show I saw in Toronto last week. It was great to see them (three-quarters of them, anyway) for the first time ever, and they're so not-silly compared to most bands who've been around as long as they have. But I was disappointed for the most basic of reasons: they didn't play the songs I wanted to hear. Of the five I was really hoping for, "Map Reference" was all they did; no "Mannequin," "Dot Dash," "Too Late," or "Ahead."

They seemed utterly bored with themselves during the Fallon performance.

Saw 'em last night in Austin, and while it wasn't bad (I've never seen them really bad), it was sloppier than normal and yeah . . . they seemed utterly bored with themselves. The vocal sound was awful, too. I love the new album, though (in fact, everything they've done in the last eight years is better as a whole compared to everything else they've done post-154.) Still, I was chuffed to see the place packed and everyone excited.

The album has endured. I Play "A Flat Tent" and "Please Give" all the time.

You know, another thing about the Fallon performance and last night's show in Austin - Colin Newman seems to have lost his ability to actually sing. He kind of just mumbles with relatively little projection. I've always liked his voice, particularly its surprisingly clarity even against a barrage of noise (at times), but check out the Fallon performance of "Map Ref" and notice how - despite the relative smoothness and calm of the song - he's utterly underwhelming. What's up with that? One can ascribe it to boredom I suppose, but . . ?

I dunno -- check out the second or third track from RBT, the one that sounds a bit like "I Am The Fly."

I feel like I should have warned my friends who really only love the first three albums that Wire don't generally play much stuff from those records live these days.

I feel like I should have warned my friends who really only love the first three albums that Wire don't generally play much stuff from those records live these days.

They've always been like that, there's bootlegs from 1978/79 where 75% of the set is unreleased material

Actually they probably don't do that as much these days

I feel like I should have warned my friends who really only love the first three albums that Wire don't generally play much stuff from those records live these days.

Yes, why didn't you warn me? Oh yeah--you don't know me and may live on the other side of the world. Still. (Glad I saw the show anyway.)

Still haven't found a vinyl copy that's playable. Anyone find one? I attempted to order one via the Pink Flag mail order but that place is apparently run by folks who are easily distracted. I never rec'd it. Their follow-thru was less than stellar.