Challenger Archives - Various Small Flames

Quiet, Constant Friends: John Ross – The Overlook Hotel

Jon Doyle — Fri, 23 Oct 2015 17:22:56 +0000

So this is it, the final track-unveiling post for Quiet, Constant Friends. Fittingly, we’re ending on a sad, reflective note. ‘The Overlook Hotel’, by John Ross of Wild Pink, is a song based on Stephen King’s The Shining. Using simple guitars and a lo-fi hiss, the tracks creates a a real sense of melancholy and vulnerability.

“Have a drink and think about
the way the shrubs just moved
Is this place talking to me?
Or am I crazy?”

Remember that you can (and should) order Quiet, Constant Friends on cassette via the Wake the Deaf Bandcamp page. Each tape comes with a postcard print of one of the original artworks, so it will be a package full of pretty little things. Every penny of the profits go straight to Worldreader so what are you waiting for? Tell your family, friends and enemies too.

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WTD’s Advent Calendar – 12 – Challenger

Jon Doyle — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 09:46:06 +0000

Challenger have released their debut album The World Is Too Much For Me. The album was (at least partly) thought up while two of the band members were working on the soundtrack of the film ’Not Waving But Drowning’ and the press release says that the record is inspired by looking out over the city lights of Lower Manhatten. While this may all sound romantic and lovely, the other key theme on the album is desperation. To quote the blurb:

’Challenger began out of desperation. Desperate to feel better, desperate to escape, desperate for something more. Challenger is that cry. Alone, or together, the cry that sounds like a plea but builds momentum and becomes a force of change, of light, of positivity, of love; a change you can dance to.’

The result is a just that. A juxtaposition of frightened whispered lyrics, cool 80s beats reminiscent of Drive, and the upbeat piano of Paul Simon. It is desperation looking for positivity. It is anxiety and heartbreak that you can dance to. It is pop music at it’s finest.

Listen to a track below, stream the album over at Consequence Of Sound, and buy the album on iTunes and the like.

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Wake The Deaf’s Advent Calendar

Jon Doyle — Wed, 28 Nov 2012 15:51:00 +0000

Join us as we share 25 of our favourite new (at least to us) artists over the month of December, one per day. There’s no particular order or theme, just good music in the countdown to Christmas.

1st – Annie Dressner
2nd – Knots
3rd – Ljóst
4th – Fantasy Rainbow
5th – Timid, The Brave
6th – BLACK ZEROS
7th – Reuben Hollebon
8th – Sam Moss
9th – Portage
10th – Angel Olsen
11th – Moon Ate The Dark
12th – Challenger
13th – ScotDrakula
14th – Dusted
15th – Loraine
16th – Husky
17th – SNOWBEAST
18th – Mike Tod
19th – Stalwart Sons
20th – Old Ugly’s Christmas With Friends
21st – Nils Frahm’s Screws Reworked
22nd – The Holidays Don’t Have To Be So Rotten
23rd – The Tree Ring
CHRISTMAS EVE – Fred Woods

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