bdrmm have revealed details of their second album ‘I Don’t Know’, and have signed to Mogwai’s label Rock Action. Check out new single ‘It’s Only a Little Blood’ below, along with our interview with the Hill four-piece.
‘It’s Just A Bit of Blood’ comes with visuals directed by Chris Tomsett of Innerstrings. The track will be familiar to longtime fans of the band, having been a staple of the band’s live shows for over two years.
“People have loved singing along to it before we even recorded it, so it felt like a natural place to start,” explains guitarist Joe Vickers. NME. Bassist and keyboardist Jordan Smith explained that the song served as a bridge between the shoegaze-inflected sound of their 2020 debut album ‘Bedroom’ and a wider pool of influences that defined ‘I Don’t Know’. Is.
“It has the sensibilities of the first album, but it works the way we work now, so it’s a good jumping off point,” he said. “We’re not putting out a six-minute dance song right now, that can wait until release day!”
‘I Don’t Know’ sees the band embracing not only dance music but also trip-hop, slow cover, experimental and ambient music. Drummer Conor Murray, meanwhile, brings much of his love of jazz music to the album’s beats.
“After the first record, we spent a lot of time together because we couldn’t get back into the studio. [due to the coronavirus pandemic] And we decided we might as well do it on our own terms,” Smith said. “We’re going to try and fail but stay true to the music we want to make, rather than just four. Keep making minute shoegaze banners. That’s great, but we have more strings to our bow.
He added that the positive reception to Long Form’s standalone single ‘Three’ last year encouraged him when it came to experimenting. “It’s not that it’s shocking by any means, it’s just a piano on it, but eventually when the reaction came it forced us to go with a really unconventional approach.”
Coming out of lockdown was also an element of the record’s wider emotional range. “After wallowing in self-pity for so long, sitting alone in your underwear, it just didn’t feel right to go back to being so sad! We’ve done it, so it’s time to try again and smile.” ,” Smith said.
Following the unexpected success of their debut album, Five Star declared it a “modern-day shoegaze classic”. NME After review, the band said they went through a number of “false starts” when it came to figuring out the best way to launch the follow-up. “We were originally trying to write it in COVID, then we started again six months after that with Alex. [Greaves, producer of the band’s debut]But we were not mentally ready at all. We tried again with a different producer, but it wasn’t working the way we wanted. Finally, we were in the right place, so we went back to Alex to do it right, and then it flowed and worked well.
Ultimately, Smith said, “I think spending all that time throwing dirt at the wall and seeing what sticks helped. At first, we tried to make it really guitar-centric and a traditional live recording. Kay, but we realized that’s not what we want to do. We’ve been messing around with tricks and sounds in the studio, so not being able to do that felt like we were cutting our legs for no reason. are cutting
Vickers added: “This album feels like a risk because we’ve changed labels and sounds, but it’s a risk we felt we had to take. It’s not good to remake the same album and do the same thing. Is.
The new label in question is Rock Action, founded and run by Scottish post-rock veterans Mogwai. He first encountered frontman Stuart Braithwaite when he came to see the band at The Hug And Pint in Glasgow in 2021. “He was the nicest guy in the world,” Vickers recalled. “It felt like a crazy moment when Stuart from Mogwai talked about our music, with someone you respect so much that they’ve come to see us play.”
The band was later invited to support Mogwai on their European tour in 2022. “At the time, some of us were struggling with how we saw the longevity of bdrmm,” Smith recalled. “It was before we recorded our new album, and it’s hard when you don’t really know how to pace yourself. I think spending so much time with him [Mogwai] And all their staff, seeing their relationship 30 years later, made us realize, ‘Yes, this is where we want to be.’
“It felt like being part of a big family. They asked us to sign to Rock Action after one show. I felt safe knowing that they actually cared about our music and Want to help us get on the path to fixing something instead of trying to do something.”
He continued: “I think Martin [Bulloch, Mogwai drummer] Specifically asked us to take care that the band moves as a whole. It’s okay to just try to enjoy the music, but you also have to be practical. They’re completely absurd and they’re always connected in a way that we make music instead of sitting back because it can’t work.
At this stage, Mogwai aren’t the only big fans of bdrmm. “‘Bedroom’ was a lockdown album, so none of us were expecting anything to happen. Then Andy Bell from Ride and Simone Marie Butler from Primal Scream are saying they love the record, all this. The great reviews came from places we’d read for years, like Five Stars NME. It’s just ridiculous,” Smith said. However, he said the group isn’t feeling any extra pressure. “We were so apart of it, it never really registered and never seemed to. Put pressure on us and make us smart. The most important thing is to make sure it doesn’t affect the way we record music.
As with his debut album, lead singer and Jordan’s brother Ryan Smith has once again drawn deeply from personal experiences for the lyrical content of ‘I Don’t Know’, the new single ‘It’s Just A Bit of Blood’. ‘with mental health awareness and its coping with anxiety and depression. This time, however, his brother says, the rest of the band pushed for him to add to the ambiguity.
“On the first record, it’s nailed down what the songs are about, but I think the ideas and themes on this record are very broad, so you can take whatever you want from it. Me and Alex have a There was the thing where we asked Ryan not to use the words ‘you’ or ‘I’, just to make it more about an idea rather than closing down one person’s perspective. I think that’s really refreshing. was,” he said.
“It’s more interesting as a listener. [when songs are more open to interpretation]. We never want to make an album that you listen to once and think ‘I’ve got all of this’ then put it down. I have heard. [Radiohead’s] ‘In Rainbows’ has been my favorite album ever since my dad put it on when I was seven and it still is.
‘I Don’t Know’ will be released on June 30 via Rock Action. Check out the full tracklist below.
1. ‘Alps’
2. ‘be careful’
3. ‘It’s just a little blood’
4. ‘We Fall Apart’
5. ‘Advertisement One’
6. ‘Hidden Cinema’
7. ‘Pulling Stitches’
8. ‘One Final Movement’
bdrmm will also be supporting Mogwai at The Garage in London tomorrow (Tuesday 7 February). Visit here. For tickets and more information.
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