Bat For Lashes

Two Suns

(Astralwerks; April 6^th, 2009)

BAT FOR LASHES NYC PRESS DAYS:  January 26, 27, 28!

 

"I will rise now, and go about the city in the streets, and in the broadways i will seek him whom my soul loveth:  I sought him, but found him not. The watchmen that go about the city found me: to whom I said, Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?"

Song of Solomon 3:2,3

 

Brighton, England’s Bat For Lashes is set to release her highly-anticipated sophomore album, Two Suns, on April 6^th, 2009.  Two Suns is the follow-up to Natasha Khan’s critically-acclaimed debut, Fur and Gold. 

Fur and Gold’s July 2007 release heralded Natasha Khan as an astoundingly bright new voice in the music world.  Her album was nominated for England’s prestigious Mercury Prize in 2007, in addition to garnering her two Brit Award nominations in early 2008, and received high praise from the likes of Spin, Blender, the New York Times and more.  England’s The Guardian named Natasha one of 2007’s Women of the Year, a list which also included Hillary Clinton and Anita Roddick, and Radiohead personally asked Bat for Lashes to support them on their UK/European tour last summer.  And in between all of these incredible accolades, Natasha tucked herself away into various studios around the globe to begin work on her newest creation, a collection of eleven brilliant songs that see her stretching the limits of her own imagination and plunging to the depths of her own consciousness to make sense of herself and how she relates to the world around her.

If Fur and Gold set Natasha on her journey, Two Suns is the middle of her travels, a record of modern-day fables exploring dualities on a number of levels – two lovers, two planets, two sides of a personality.  Recorded all over the world, from the stark landscape of Big Sur and Joshua Tree in California, to the city sprawls of New York and London, to the serenity of Brighton and Wales, it is an album of epic geographical and artistic scope.  Envisioning herself as two separate yet ultimately attached beings, Khan introduces the inner character of Pearl, a destructive, self-absorbed, blonde, femme fatale of a persona who acts as a direct foil to Khan’s more mystical, desert-born spiritual self.  The songs on the album unfold the story of these two sides of the same coin, as they intertwine and overflow into each other’s worlds, reconciling their differences and their needs. Using classic story-telling imagery and magical realism within its narratives, Two Suns digs deeply into the philosophy of the self and duality, examining the need for both chaos and balance, for both love and pain, in addition to touching on metaphysical ideas concerning the connections between all existence. 

Co-produced by Natasha and Dave Kosten, with whom she worked on Fur and Gold, Two Suns further enhances this idea of dualities in its music, mixing autoharps with intense electronics, complex drum rhythms with lush keyboards and strings.  The album features guest turns from the legendary Scott Walker (on album closer “The Big Sleep”), Brooklyn psychrockers Yeasayer, and her own band The Blue Dreams (who toured with her this summer) on several tracks, but Khan herself worked the majority of the musical magic, playing pianos, synths, guitar, bass, drums, beat programming and more.  And then, of course, there’s Natasha’s illuminating voice as the core of every song, sounding bolder, fuller and more impressive than ever before. 

Opener “Glass,” whose first lines are taken from the love poem “Song of Solomon,” sets the tone for the album’s exploration of two’s, describing two archetypal lovers coming together and pulling apart against dark, pulsing drums and crystalline bells.  “Sleep Alone” details the sickly, lonely quiet that comes after trouble, while “Moon and Moon,” a live favorite from the Fur and Gold tour, laments a lover’s distance and the struggle to return.  First single “Daniel” is hazy, wistful and nostalgic, mixing dreamy keyboards with Cocteau Twins-esque drums to give us one of Two Suns’ finest choruses, and “Siren Song” introduces the conflicting whims of Pearl, the music expressing both her desire for closeness, and her vested interest in destruction.  “Good Love” sounds as if it’s come from a waking dream, the organs burning slowly against Natasha’s languid vocals and half-awake hand claps, while “Two Planets” could be the album’s defining moment, moved by intense, circular rhythms, and dancing with moon-lit, keyboard droplets.  Closing track “The Big Sleep,” creaking with a ghostly piano and Scott Walker’s emotive delivery, folds Natasha’s spiritual self together with Pearl, confronting the end of the illusory world and preparing herself for wherever the world will take her next…

Upon Two Suns’ release, Bat for Lashes will be touring America throughout 2009.  Dates to be announced soon.

 

Track listing for Two Suns:

1.  Glass

2.  Sleep Alone

3.  Moon and Moon

4.  Daniel

5.  Peace of Mind

6.  Siren Song

7.  Pearl’s Dream

8.  Good Love

9.  Two Planets

10.  Traveling Woman

11.  The Big Sleep