Friday, June 22, 2012

Starring Announce August US Tour w/ Guardian Alien New Album "ABCDEFG-HIJKLMNOP-QRSTUV-WXYZ" Out Now on Northern Spy Records!



In support of their recently released new album titled "ABCDEFG-HIJKLMNOP-QRSTUV-WXYZ" out now on Northern Spy Records, Brooklyn-based kraut-punk outfit Starring has announced an upcoming August US tour with Guardian Alien (Thrill Jockey Records).

The upcoming dates follow the band's recent appearance at this year's Northside Festival, and also includes a stop at the Spy Music Festival taking place July 7th at 285 Kent Ave. in Brooklyn, where the band will perform alongside Dustin Wong + Dan Friel, White Out + Charles Gayle and PC Worship.



Starring Live
July 7th 285 Kent Ave Brooklyn, NY *
Aug 8th Floristree Space Baltimore, MD ^
Aug 9th The Pilot Light Knoxville, TN ^
Aug 10th 529 Atlanta, GA ^
Aug 11th The Basement Nashville, TN ^
Aug 12th Siberia New Orleans, LA ^
Aug 13th Walter’s on Washington Houston, TX ^
Aug 14th Mohawk Austin, TX ^
Aug 15th Record Bar Kansas City, MO ^
Aug 16th The Firebird St. Louis, MO ^
Aug 18th The Hideout Chicago, IL ^
Aug 19th The Mill Iowa City, IA ^
Aug 20th Cactus Club Madison, WI ^
Aug 22nd Happy Dog Cleveland, OH ^
Aug 23rd Double Double Land Toronto, ON ^

* = Dustin Wong + Dan Friel, White Out + Charles Gayle, PC Worship
^ = w/ Guardian Alien


About Starring:

“...Starring fold a delay bubble into a Farfisa freak-out into a Neu!-ish buildup and shove everything inside a tiny room that's vibrating with processed drums and tattoo-gun percussion... a sundry spoonful of familiar sounds and sweet surprises..." - SPIN

"...venturing from eerie Slint-isms to Krupa beats to circus goth..." - MTV Hive

"...what sets the album apart from your run-of-the-mill post-rock record is its ability to assemble seemingly disparate instruments and styles into bracing, muscular songs that encourage repeat listens..." - CMJ

"Starring is trying to force incredibly complex ideas about Krauty synths, proggy pop, and where bands can put diverse instrumentation into the small object that is a vinyl record." - IMPOSE

"...this six-song Eurotrash epic is a heady brew of prog, krautrock, No Wave, free jazz and neo-classical. Drop the virtual needle, and brace yourself for the best." - My Old Kentucky Blog


Northern Spy Records announces a full-length album from avant-rock experimentalists Starring. Playful stalwarts of the Brooklyn DIY scene, last year Starring holed up in Brooklyn’s St. Cecilia’s Church with producer Matt Mehlan (frontman of Skeletons and collaborator with Congoronics vs Rockers) to compose an album of six compositions they call ABCDEFG-HIJKLMNOP-QRSTUV-WXYZ.

Starring’s ABCDEFG-HIJKLMNOP-QRSTUV-WXYZ combines minimalist musical patterns with dreamy poetry to create a new style front-woman Clara Hunter likes to call “sparkle prog.” It captures the frenetic energy of the band’s live show, but here it is overlain with a new palate of synthesizers, delay effects, drum processing, aux percussion, and vocals that create delicate, but sometimes radical juxtapositions between the lyrical and the experimental. Though songs like “the best” and “aphonia” channel the loud, raw, and repetitive “circus punk” of Starring’s early releases, much of this record speaks with a broader sense of expressive depth.

Over the course of the album’s six cuts, choruses soar at monstrous heights framed by mechanical and occult trances. Dead jazz turns up with fuzzy 8-bit solos, whistling synths pipe beneath ghostly choral arrangements, viola lines in Turkish modes swoop into ornamented curls and loops, and singer Clara Hunter’s girlish vocals whisper the record’s secrets with surreal, woozy melodies. Concretely, the album reflects an aesthetic that recalls the classic sounds of European prog rock (Magma, Faust, Neu!), the unhinged grit of 1970’s New York no wave artists like Suicide, the earliest cuts from minimalists like Terry Riley and Philip Glass, and even a dose of post-rock’s strung-out improvisations.



Album art courtesy of Alex Ness

"ABCDEFG-HIJKLMNOP-QRSTUV-WXYZ" Track List:
1. the best
2. ie
3. ---------ooooooooooo
4. aphonia
5. ....7....
6. wo

For more information, visit:
www.starringmusic.com
Starring on Facebook
www.northern-spy.com

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