What are you hearing when you hear AU?
What are you seeing when you see AU?
These are the questions I've been asking myself over the
past few months of getting to know Luke Wyland and Dana Valatka. Stroll down
the street with them or see them side-by-side on stage: this Portland,
Oregon-based duo embodies remarkable, frantic energy. It permeates everything
they touch. More than any band I've ever known, AU brings into question the
moment and where you are in it.
AU is on the verge of the release of their third album, Both
Lights, due out on Hometapes (and the Leaf Label in Europe) this coming
Spring. A bona fide long-time-coming following 2008's acclaimed LP Verbs (and
still-memorable tours with WHY? and Deerhoof), AU is boldly throwing open the
curtains of time with their first single: "Solid Gold" (grab it at Pitchfork) is out today on a limited-edition 7"
record. Fortifying Valatka's adrenalized percussion and Wyland's soaring vocals
and multi-tentacled performance on keys and guitar, is man-machine Colin
Stetson on alto and whopping bass saxophone (most recently seen on stage with
Bon Iver). The B-side, a song woven by Wyland himself from a reinterpretation
of the album's lead track, takes Stetson's wild wind a notch higher and into
the brightly lit stratosphere.
AU reflects that light. "Solid Gold" is the first
taste of a sweeping aural experience that captures not only the journey of
Wyland and Valatka through the past three years of love, loss, and levity, but
the voyage music can take us all on if we click play and just listen. "The
back and forth, the tug of war for love," writes Wyland, getting at the
root of "Solid Gold", in essence a love song, "exhausting,
exhilarating, and so totally not sustainable." Like the best songs, in
some way or another, we can all sing along to that. -Sara Padgett
Heathcott
The AU "Solid Gold" 7" is limited to 500
copies. The transparent yellow-orange 45 RPM vinyl is packaged with full-color
transparent cover art in a heavy PVC jacket. Digital download included.
AU
Solid Gold
(Hometapes / The Leaf Label)
Street Date: Dec. 7, 2011 (US) / Jan. 9, 2012 (UK)
1. Solid Gold
2. under / Epic (feat. Colin Stetson)
AU LINKS:
Facebook -
Bandcamp -
Labels -
Worldwide: Hometapes -
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