Locust Valley, by Hella Comet

Locust Valley

by Hella Comet

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od4th very cool album.
each track is a blast !
Lea's voice fascinates me). Favorite track: Fortunate Sleepers.

The Lost Sandal on Radio Free Pensacola thumbnail

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Full Digital Discography

8

releases

Get all 8 Hella Comet releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of UMPteeeeeee, Turf, Locust Valley, No Buzz, TTMMM, Wild Honey, 10'', and Celebrate Your Loss. , and , .

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get 180g Vinyl (incl. CD + download) here

1.	Secret Body Nation 04:02		buy track
2.	Swim 03:50	info	buy track
3.	Sid 03:18		buy track
4.	Fortunate Sleepers 05:12		buy track
5.	43goes79goes43 01:41		buy track
6.	Midsummer Heat 03:51		buy track
7.	Dead Match Figure 04:16		buy track
8.	Idiots and Slavery 05:19		buy track
9.	The Wicked Art To Fake It Easy 02:42		buy track
10.	Conk Out 03:52		buy track

about

Recorded by Stefan Ernst at Freudenhaus Studio, Berlin.  
Additional Recordings at SisiTopStudio, Graz.  
Mixed by Bernd Heinrauch, Schwarzau.  
Mastered by Pete Maher, London. 
Produced by Franz Gurt.

Locust Valley is a varied album of rock songs which comes in all kinds of different hues while boasting a strong affinity to giant walls of sound which are interspersed with rugged punk guitars. Take “Dead Match Figure”, for example. You can't really listen to this song without thinking of American post punk/noise rock. The heavy guitars on “Idiots and Slavery” rumble on in a pretty mean fashion and the slightly aggressive approach to “Swim” recalls shades of early Riot Grrrl aesthetics. So is this full-blown rock now? Hella Comet beg to differ.
The album begins with somewhat of a musical quotation mark, a solar nebula if you will, before allowing the lead-off track “Secret Body Nation” to build into an anthemic gesture. A possible indication for the days of simply “playing” rock music to be numbered. The next song (if you wanna call this colourful, three minute slab of psychedelia a song) measures up to all standards of the genre but the context in which these sounds find themselves is crucial: the foundation of this particular vehicle is a tonal web which inherently carries the band's experience with advanced and experimental guitar music. Obviously drawing from the dynamics that have been pushing the envelope of rock for the past 40 years. Guitars are beaten to the point of exhaustion, forcing the strings to cry out and, in effect, sing. Melody is still celebrated but the backdrop of the entire scene is a fierce growl that forms the root note of it all.
On Locust Valley, Hella Comet are clearly abandoning the lengthy shoegaze and post rock format and seem to be focusing on a new found freedom: the ability to revert to a shorter, more basic song structure. Having said that, none of the band members really appreciate the word “song” being thrown around all that much. But the band's credo for the entire origination process for this album has been to disregard expectation – most importantly their own. Resting somewhere between sensuality and spirituality, song-oriented expression and sonic experimentation as an experience, Hella Comet delve into auditory stimulation and the abstraction thereof. All the while maintaining their highly untheoretical approach as most of their songs are very much work-in-progress creations. Pieces of music are diligently rehearsed, researched and explored, leaving the end result up to entropy. Random sections are deconstructed and moody passages are expanded upon. This particular process leaves a lot for the cutting room floor but what they ended up with found its perfect frame with Locust Valley.

credits

released September 8, 2016

Visions #283

Das Indierock-Quartett aus Graz ist verschwenderisch. Wer ihr viertes Album Locust Valley auf Vinyl kauft, erhält das Album dreimal: eine CD und ein Downloadcode liegen bei. Man bekommt aber auch großartige Songs, die wie Swim den Noise von Sonic Youth mit Shoegaze und viel Mut zur Eingängigkeit verbinden. Das Highlight ist sicher Sängerin Lea Sonneks rauchig-tiefe Stimme, mit der die Band über ein Alleinstellungsmerkmal verfügt, das noch mehr entdecken müssen. Etwa auf Tour im Oktober mit Mike Watt.

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about

Hella Comet Graz, Austria

Dense walls of guitar sounds and the ethereal vocals of bass player Lea Sonnek – the comparison with Sonic Youth suggests itself, shoegaze elements are also undeniable. But this doesn’t quite describe it all: the music of the Austrian band also draws inspiration from various post-rock acts of the 1990s, as can be deduced from song lengths beyond seven minutes and cunning drum beats. ... more

Recommendations

discography

UMPteeeeeee

Dec 2021
Turf

Jun 2018
Locust Valley

Sep 2016
No Buzz

Sep 2014
TTMMM

Apr 2014
Wild Honey

Nov 2013
10''

Apr 2011
Celebrate Your Loss

Jan 2010

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