Stanley Brinks & Freschard: on tour with The Wave Pictures

Stanley Brinks & Freschard head out on tour on Friday in support of their new album Pizza Espresso, The Wave Pictures.

Having already released 2 of the best albums of 2014 (Gin on Fika Recordings, and Boom Biddy Boom on wiaiwya) Stanley Brinks & Freschard are releasing Pizza Espresso - an album of duets, and a collaboration between both labels – on the 25th of August.

Pizza Espresso is an album of love songs about drinking and drinking songs about love. Picture Emmylou and Gram relocated to Berlin with a guitar, a pennywhistle and a washboard and writing ten gorgeous duets to be sung on lazy summer evenings.

“if you have time, and nothing on your mind, why, i’m free, for you and me”

Stanley Brinks & Freschard, with The Wave Pictures tour dates:

AUGUST 15 Fri CAMBRIDGE - The Portland Arms (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 16 Sat BRISTOL - The Louisiana (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 17 Sun GREEN MAN FESTIVAL (Stanley Brinks and the Wave Pictures)
AUGUST 18 Mon LEEDS - Brudenell Social Club (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 19 Tues HARROGATE - Major Tom's Social Café Bar (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 20 Wed EAGLESCLIFFE - The Waiting Room (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 21 Thurs NEWCASTLE - Cluny (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 22 Fri EDINBURGH - Sneaky Pete’s (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 23 Sat DOUNE, (near STIRLING) - The Rabbit Hole (Stanley Brinks and the Wave Pictures)
AUGUST 24 Sun DOUNE - The Rabbit Hole (The Wave Pictures and Freschard)
AUGUST 25 Mon SHEFFIELD - Riverside, Point Blank Theatre (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 26 Tues LONDON - Shacklewell Arms (Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures + Freschard)
AUGUST 27 Wed FALMOUTH - Beerwolf Books (Stanley Brinks and Freschard only)
AUGUST 28 Thurs EXETER - The Cavern (Stanley Brinks and Freschard only)

Stanley Brinks & Freschard

Following their two 7" singles on Fika Recordings (this year's Commuter Love, and last year's Hey Sailor Boy!), Cosines finally release their debut album Oscillations at the end of July. Be quick if you want a copy - neither track feature on the album so this is your only chance!

Out Of The Fire is a sneak peak - think repetitive synth riffs, pulsating rhythm and crunchy guitars, which reveal a song which perfectly encapsulates the band and sets the tone for the rest of the album. We'll be revealing more from the album over the next couple of weeks... In the meantime, you can pre-order a copy here, on 12" black vinyl, handmade CDR or as a download.

Having already released 2 of the best albums of 2014 (Gin on Fika Recordings, and Boom Biddy Boom on wiaiwya) Stanley Brinks and Freschard are releasing Pizza Espresso - an album of duets, and a collaboration between both labels – at the end of August.

Pizza Espresso is an album of love songs about drinking and drinking songs about love. Picture Emmylou and Gram relocated to Berlin with a guitar, a pennywhistle and a washboard and writing ten gorgeous duets to be sung on lazy summer evenings.

Stanley Brinks & The Wave Pictures with Freschard August 26th @ The Shacklewell Arms, London Tickets available here

Cosines - Oscillations

Following their two 7" singles on Fika Recordings (this year's Commuter Love, last year's Hey Sailor Boy!), Cosines finally release their debut album Oscillations at the end of July. Be quick if you want a copy - neither track feature on the album so this is your only chance!

Out Of The Fire is a sneak peak - think repetitive synth riffs, pulsating rhythm and crunchy guitars, which reveal a song which perfectly encapsulates the band and sets the tone for the rest of the album. We'll be revealing more from the album over the next couple of weeks... In the meantime, you can pre-order a copy here, on 12" black vinyl, handmade CDR or as a download.

Cosines "Commuter Love" new single out May 12th

London’s Cosines are back with Commuter Love / Disclosed Stories 7”, their follow up to their debut single Hey Sailor Boy! / The Answer. Once again on the unstoppable Fika Recordings label (home of Tigercats, Making Marks, the Smittens) which is becoming known as the beacon of what’s cool and classy coming out of the indie pop underground in the UK.

As with their debut Cosines schizophrenic nature is their strength with being able to float above the current indie pop crop by infusing elements of baroque pop, krautrock, sunshine pop revival, glam rock, and synth-driven new wave while never taking so much from any genre to bog themselves down and lose sight of crafting perfect pop hits.

The A-side Commuter Love is the tale of someone who spends their days commuting to work set to a glam rock and romp. It’s an icy cool song about train commutes with nods to Blondie’s pouty pomp and Goldfrapp’s sultry stomp. Lyrics we can all relate to set to verse chorus verse, it’s a hit all the way to the top to help ease your working week and those daily travels. You know the moments where you are sitting there and you slip into your mind and you realize you are stationary and your life is passing you by. Time wasted in transit from station to station all to sit stationary at work at a desk or monitor only to get home to be so tired you are sat stationary again flipping from yet another type of station to station. You have more knowledge about the characters on tv and their lives than those of your friends.

The B-Side Disclosed Stories walks the line between sunshine revival, motorik krautrock-isms and stoic soul. It’s like if Camera Obscura was influenced by Neu! and fronted by Kirsty MacColl. The song recalls a place we’ve all been at some point where you have that one friend which is so close you think maybe it could work out, but you can’t ruin what you have. You are there for each other sharing those stories and times that are pure frustration watching each other make mistakes. You think if the person you were with was like them, but you know it will end it heartbreak if you did.

Pre-order the new 7" single "Commuter Love" from Cosines

Making Marks "Bruises" free download

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We're revealing another track from the upcoming Making Marks album "A Thousand Half-Truths". And, for one week only, you'll be able to download Bruises for free.

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Pre-order A Thousand Half-Truths on 12" heavyweight vinyl, digipack CD or digital download.

Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures - Maybe I Will See You Again

Stanley Brinks is joined by The Wave Pictures on their first joint release for 4 years with upcoming 7” single Orange Juice. Orange Juice is an anthemic singalong about a recipe for happiness - “a little bit of you, alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, ephedrine and orange juice”.

B-side Maybe I Will See You Again is, rather aptly after the concoction of Orange Juice before it, a song about standing at a street corner with a hangover. It has previously appeared on the album ‘Stanley Brinks Hovers’, but this is a new rock'n roll version backed by The Wave Pictures. Orange Juice is out on the 20th January on 7" orange vinyl and is available digitally.

Neither track features on the new Stanley Brinks & The Wave Pictures album ‘Gin’, out in March.

Pre-order Orange Juice on 7" / downloadPre-order Gin on 12" / CD / download

There's also a sneak peak of the A-side for Orange Juice from the test pressings here

Barcodes video from Making Marks

Here's the new video from Making Marks, recorded during their summer North American tour with Tigercats and The Smittens. See if you can spot members of both dancing throughout the video... It was recorded on the drive from a wonderful Richmond, Virginia house show on the way to a hectic show in Washington DC (and just before we blew a tyre on the interstate and limped the hire car back home).

The single comes out on the 5th of August on 7" vinyl - both tracks are exclusive versions that won't feature on their upcoming album, due out early 2014. There's also a banging remix from Skantze on the download. Pre-order here (and pick up their debut 7", Ticket Machine, at the same time).

25th July: Secret Garden Party, Cambridgeshire, UK (Django Django, Soulwax, Regina Spektor...) 28th July: Indietracks, Derbyshire, UK (The Pastels, Camera Obscura, Helen Love...) 30th July: The Glad Cafe, Glasgow, UK (with The Ballet & The Felt Tips) 31st July: The Maze, Nottingham, UK (with The Ballet & We Show Up On Radar) 1st August: The Lexington, London, UK (with The Ballet & Without Feathers) 22nd August: Cafeteatret, Oslo, Norway

Cosines - Hey Sailor Boy!

Here's the video for Cosines' debut 7" single Hey Sailor Boy!, out on Monday. Inspired by the video for Kellie Marie's "It Feels Like I'm in Love", the videos follows two sailor's drunken debaucheries around central London. The video features prostitution, drug taking and nudity.

The video was shot by Simon Love on one rainy afternoon in April, the band spent most of the afternoon in the pub or running away from HMS Belfast security man Roly. Drummer Jonny slept the whole day so missed the filming. It was directed and choreographed by Simon Love.

Buy the 7" single here.

Darren Hayman - Bugbears

BugbearsLPFront

It's happening again! After the sold out screenprinted 10" Christmas In Howarth EP we released for Darren Hayman the Christmas before last, we've another release from him out on Fika Recordings, this time a full length LP! The album has evolved dramatically from our first discussions with Darren about Bugbears and has materialised into one of the most ambitious projects we've undertaken so far. So let's run you through all the important details you need to know!

Bugbears LP vinyl book

Bugbears ...is an album of songs from the English Civil Wars and seventeenth century to accompany The Violence. Here's Darren's explanation of Bugbears:

I recently made an album called ‘The Violence’. It concerns itself with the East Anglian witch trials during the English Civil Wars. During my research I started to come across folk songs of the seventeenth century and Stuart era. Two such songs appear on that album: ‘When the King Enjoys His Own Again’ and ‘A Coffin for King Charles, A Crown for Cromwell and a Pit for the People’. 

I didn’t seek to achieve forensic detail when finding these songs, but was keen to have a sense of the flavour of the music of the era. As a side project to the album, I started to record and adapt some of the songs, and now they are collected here. Consider this an accompanying volume to The Violence, a scene setter, a spin off. Although I did a fair amount of research, these are not meant to be definitive or historical readings of the songs. I have revised, edited and even rewritten in places.

The Short Parliament Joining Darren on Bugbears are Bill Botting, Dan Mayfield, Dave Watkins, David Tattersall and Johny Lamb.

Formats We'll be presenting Bugbears on 180gr heavyweight 12" vinyl (including a download code) and within a beautiful CD gatefold package. Both formats come with a 16 page booklet of illustrations, lyrics and Darren's notes, interpretations and commentary.

Illustrations Duncan Barrett is the genius behind the sleeve artwork and the booklet design. His artwork has graced numerous Fika releases in the past and hopefully many more to come! The booklet itself features an illustration for each of the 13 songs on Bugbears, from 13 different artists. Among those involved were Pam Berry, Robert Rotifer, Dan Willson and Ant Harding.

The Blog Over the next two months in the run up to the release on the 15th of July, Darren and I will be hosting a blog. Expect to find previews of the songs, videos, interviews from historians and musicians, features of the illustrators and plenty more.

Pre-order The album is available to pre-order from the Fika Recording shop now, shipping in early July.

Bugbears CD and booklet

Follow the Bugbears blog at fikarecordings.com/bugbears

Distro

We're starting to do a little bit of distribution. Currently, it'll mainly be releases from artists working with Fika Recordings, who've released records previously/simultaneously on other labels. We want to help you explore their back catalogue, save on postage costs and enjoy more excellent music!So far, we've got the debut 7" single from Victoria and Jacob. We've just a handful of copies left of their single With No Certainty / There's A War - once they're gone, they're gone forever. And when they do, you'll need to keep your eyes peeled for their next digital single on Fika in April and their 7" single in May. As well as that, we've an LP and a CD from My Little Pony, who went on to become Making Marks having lost a member of the original band. Pick up a copy of their debut 12" LP Think Too Much, which features one of my favourite songs, and favourite lines:

And she said.. "Your love is like nuclear energy- it leaves a lot of stuff I don't know what to do with. And do you really love me or am I just in your network?"

We've also got a handful of copies of their second album, called Making Marks, available on CD.