Hidden Shoal News
The World of Dust “Samsara” Out Now (Vinyl, CD, Digital)
The day has finally come! Samsara, the utterly brilliant collaboration between Dutch slowcore dream-pop artist The World of Dust’s Stefan Breuer and Todd Tobias (Guided by Voices, Robert Pollard, Circus Devils) has now officially entered the world. The album is available now in vinyl, CD and digital formats via Tiny Room Records in collaboration with Hidden Shoal. Also don’t forget to check out the wonderful new music video for single, ‘Tarot’.
Samsara is effectively a full-length collaboration between The World of Dust’s Stefan Breuer and Todd Tobias (Guided by Voices, Robert Pollard, Circus Devils). Previously contributing keyboard arrangements for 2015’s World of Dust album Womb Realm, Tobias created all the instrumental backdrops for Samsara’s evocative songs. A shadowy universe of forlorn beauty, this lo-fi bedroom pop experiment is shrouded in elemental imagery and laden with ennui. Intimate and wistful, Samsara mines a similarly rich emotive seam to Norwegian slowcore legends The White Birch.
The process for Samsara saw Tobias send Breuer 26 instrumental ideas, from which Breuer chose those which resonated with him most. Over the course of nearly two years, Breuer wrote and refined an especially personal suite of lyrics, reflecting his struggles with his mental health and his experience of becoming a father. The result is World of Dust’s most fully realised and vivid album to date.
All tracks from Samsara as well as the music of Todd Tobias is available for licensing for film, tv, web, games and beyond via Hidden Shoal. Check here for more info.
New Single from The World of Dust ‘Tarot’ – Music Video & Stream
We’re very excited to present the the second single lifted from Samsara, the fifth album by Dutch slowcore dream-pop artist The World of Dust. The single is accompanied by wonderfully playful music video The World of Dust’s Stefan Breuer. Check out the video here and stream the song here. The album will see official release on the 1st of March 2019 via Hidden Shoal and Tiny Room Records with pre-orders available now.
Samsara is effectively a full-length collaboration between The World of Dust’s Stefan Breuer and Todd Tobias (Guided by Voices, Robert Pollard, Circus Devils). Previously contributing keyboard arrangements for 2015’s World of Dust album Womb Realm, Tobias created all the instrumental backdrops for Samsara’s evocative songs. A shadowy universe of forlorn beauty, this lo-fi bedroom pop experiment is shrouded in elemental imagery and laden with ennui. Intimate and wistful, Samsara mines a similarly rich emotive seam to Norwegian slowcore legends The White Birch.
The process for Samsara saw Tobias send Breuer 26 instrumental ideas, from which Breuer chose those which resonated with him most. Over the course of nearly two years, Breuer wrote and refined an especially personal suite of lyrics, reflecting his struggles with his mental health and his experience of becoming a father. The result is World of Dust’s most fully realised and vivid album to date.
All tracks from Samsara as well as the music of Todd Tobias is available for licensing for film, tv, web, games and beyond via Hidden Shoal. Check here for more info.
Slow Dancing Society “Fantosmes” Out Now (Vinyl, Tape, CD & Digital)
We’re very excited to announce the release of another slice of Slow Dancing Society brilliance. The sublime four track long player Fantosmes is now available on vinyl, tape, CD and in digital formats. The tape release is in collaboration with the wonderful folks at Dreamshore Tapes and all other physical and digital formats are available at the Slow Dancing Society Bandcamp page and all good third party digital stores and streaming services.
Following on from The Torchlight Parade Vols. I–II, voted as the best ambient release of 2018 by Textura, Fantosmes finds Slow Dancing Society expanding his twilight enquiries in multiple dimensions. Comprising four eleven-plus-minute tracks, the expansive breadth and depth of this album is tempered by its attention to texture and detail. Sullivan masterfully terraforms astonishingly vivid and robust soundscapes from otherwise fragile, ephemeral sounds. Whereas The Torchlight Parade Vols. I–II felt like a night drive through cities and suburbs, Fantosmes seeks to escape our earthly bounds, with a more universal, cosmic trajectory.
“More than a decade after the release of his first Slow Dancing Society collection, The Sound of Lights When Dim, Drew Sullivan continues to uphold the high standard of that debut with his two-volume The Torchlight Parade… an encompassing portrait of this distinguished ambient-electronic artist” – Textura on The Torchlight Parade, their #1 ambient album of 2018
“Drew Sullivan continues to confirm his status as a master of instrumental melodic ambience” – Long Live Vinyl (Wyndham Wallace) on The Torchlight Parade
The entire Slow Dancing Society catalogue is available for licensing across film, tv, web, games and beyond. Check out our licensing page for more info and don’t hesitate to contact us to see how we can work together on your project.
Three Questions With Connected View
Connected View produce trojan horses. On first listen their output is littered with seemingly innocent, naive late-night instrumental jams, but on each successive spin you begin to notice the patterns and the purposefulness. By this time the woozy, rolling melodies have begun to mesmerise and before you know it you’ve fallen through the wormhole. Kinetic synths, sinuous basslines, live drums and found sounds intertwine to create an atmosphere akin to eavesdropping on Boards of Canada improvising with Fridge. Playful, dirty, brooding, radiant and rhythmic. Magic stuff!
To learn a little more about what makes Connected View tick we asked the boys to pull three questions out of the bag…
What’s the best show you’ve ever been to?
The best show we’ve been to was Stereolab opening for Sonic Youth at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia in the year 2000. It was a crossroads in many respects. We were young and impressionable and it changed our view of music henceforth. At the time, we were huge Sonic Youth junkies, had been for years. We had heard of Stereolab, but never really investigated. Their set blew us away. It was a lot of stuff from the Microbe Hunters/ Cobra era. From there on we were Stereolab fanatics. It was just what we needed at that time. The next day I went to the record store and bought everything by Stereolab that they had in stock. Instead of noisy guitar-based music, we started seeking out more synthy and baroque stuff. We dug into the types of music that inspired the Stereolab sound and sought out decades worth of influences and then the influences of the influences. Kraut, psych, electronic, edm, tropicalia, different styles of jazz, synth pop, shoegaze, ect. We loved it all. Its been like peeling an onion. That show set us on the path to eventually making our own music.
Why make music?
We’ve been asking ourselves that question forever as well. Not sure its ever been adequately answered or ever will be. It doesn’t have to be. Whenever I ask myself this question I think of a few of my acquaintances who are not creative, or not involved in art in any way, and I just couldn’t imagine living that way, without a creative outlet. It seems like a pointless existence. Sometimes I wish I could go without music, it would save us a lot of time in editing. I’ve realized that whenever I feel down or I am having some difficulties in life, I turn to music more. It is the great escape. Other artists I’ve read in interviews have said things like “it’s the search for the unknown, a beautiful mystery that you get to unfold.” We can go with that too. There’s some kind of nervous energy within us that can only be released through music.
What’s one of your favourite albums that’s unlikely to be featured on anyone else’s list of favourite albums, and why do you love it?
One of our favorites that has seemed to be in the rotation for a long, long time & probably isn’t well known is Movietone’s ‘Blossom Filled Streets.’ We enjoyed all of Movietone’s output, but this one most. I was instantly drawn in by how it sounded as if it was recorded on the beach and the ocean imagery imbedded within. It enlightened me to the idea of concept albums beyond the proggy stuff I had previously been exposed to. It helped to form my concepts of what an album is supposed to be. A cohesive group of songs with a central theme tying them together. A theme, but also similar instruments and a style spread over a group of songs. When I hear ‘Blossom Filled Streets’ it connects me to moments and places over many years and now has that nostalgic importance that some albums obtain. To describe the sound to someone who hasn’t heard it would be difficult. The album is kind of a post-rock-ish array of horns, rhythm section, electric guitar, keyboards, bass, and sea sounds with great singing and lyrics.
The World of Dust (feat. Todd Tobias) – New Single, Album Soon!
We’re very excited to announce the release of the new single by Dutch slowcore dream-pop artist The World of Dust. ‘Blood’ is lifted from The World of Dust’s fifth album Samsara, which features our very own Todd Tobias. The album will see release on the 1st of March 2019 through Hidden Shoal and Tiny Room Records. ‘Blood’ is available to stream now via SoundCloud and will available on Spotify soon.
Samsara is effectively a full-length collaboration between The World of Dust’s Stefan Breuer and Todd Tobias (Guided by Voices, Robert Pollard, Circus Devils). Previously contributing keyboard arrangements for 2015’s World of Dust album Womb Realm, Tobias created all the instrumental backdrops for Samsara’s evocative songs. A shadowy universe of forlorn beauty, this lo-fi bedroom pop experiment is shrouded in elemental imagery and laden with ennui. Intimate and wistful, Samsara mines a similarly rich emotive seam to Norwegian slowcore legends The White Birch.
“Its power lies in the intimacy… without drowning in desolate melancholy” – hifi.nl on Womb Realm
The process for Samsara saw Tobias send Breuer 26 instrumental ideas, from which Breuer chose those which resonated with him most. Over the course of nearly two years, Breuer wrote and refined an especially personal suite of lyrics, reflecting his struggles with his mental health and his experience of becoming a father. The result is World of Dust’s most fully realised and vivid album to date.
This music is available for licensing across film, tv, web and beyond. Contact us at Hidden Shoal for more details.
Moonchy & Tobias in HCTF Best of 2018!
Pat Moonchy and Todd Tobias’s brilliant debut collaboration has been named in the top ten best albums of 2018 by the wonderful Here Comes The Flood blog. Check out the list here, and soak yourself in the dizzying glory that is Moonchy & Tobias here.
All tracks from Moonchy & Tobias are available for licensing across film, tv, web, games and beyond. Hit us up for more details.
Stunning New Kramies Video Featured in Billboard Magazine!
We’re excited to announce the release of the stunning new music video for ‘Of All the Places Been (feat. Jason Lytle)’ by American dream-pop troubadour Kramies. The music video for track, taken from his new EP Of All The Places Been & Everything The End, has just been premiered at Billboard Magazine no less! The video is directed by Anya Klausner with animation by Nogland Studios.
Created in collaboration with Jason Lytle (Grandaddy), Todd Tobias (Guided by Voices) and Jerry Becker (Train), Kramies’ epic new EP, “Of All The Places Been & Everything The End”, transports the listener through an enchanted forest of the imagination. Profoundly coloured by Kramies’ time staying at an ancient castle in Ireland, the music is steeped in fables, myths and eerie reflections, resulting in his most vividly realised release to date.
Kramies music is available for licensing across film, tv, web and beyond. Contact us at Hidden Shoal for more details.
Three Hidden Shoal Albums in Textura’s Best of 2018!
It’s that time of year and our favourite best of 2018 list is out at Textura. We’re honoured to have three of our releases included this year. Slow Dancing Society‘s The Torchlight Parade Vols. I-II was chosen by Textura as their number one ambient album of the year and Chloe March‘s Blood-Red Spark and Todd Tobias & Chloe March‘s Amialluma both featured in the overall top 10 list. Massive congratulations to those artists and many thanks to Textura for their continued support of exciting new music.
New Chloe March Single, ‘Snow Bird’
We’re excited to announce the release of the new single by English ambient-pop artist Chloe March, ‘Snow Bird’. Following on from her 2017 solo release Blood-Red Spark, and her recent collaboration with labelmate Todd Tobias, Amialluma, ‘Snow Bird’ is a luminous winter song, gently hypnotic and hopeful. The track melds dream pop and found sounds of birdsong to create a crisply detailed emotional landscape, inhabited by March’s uniquely emotive vocal.
“one of those one-in-a-million voices that could make even the most pedestrian lyric feel like cause for rapture” – Textura
“a beautiful sound somewhere between The Blue Nile and David Sylvian” – Underground of Happiness Best of 2017
‘Snow Bird’ is available to download now via Bandcamp or stream via SoundCloud. Chloe March’s music is available for licensing for film, tv, games and more through Hidden Shoal.
REW<< "Conversation Arctique" EP Out Now!
We’re excited to announce the official release of Conversation Arctique the new EP by US-based dreampop artist REW<<. The EP is available now for download and streaming via Bandcamp, iTunes, Spotify and other good 3rd party stores. REW<<‘s music is available for licensing for film, tv, games and more through Hidden Shoal.
In direct contrast to his eclectic, pop-inflected albums Departeures and Olive Skinned, Silver Tongued Sirens Sing Swan Songs, Conversation Arctique is a sparse, beautiful EP of succinct pieces for piano and strings that trace elegant melodic arcs like breath in cold air. Akin to the work of Julien Marchal, Conversation Arctique is a work of magical minimalism.
“REW<<’s Olive Skinned, Silver Tongued Sirens Sing Swan Songs is a fantastically varied, moving, and imaginative opus, and it deserves to be celebrated.” – The Big Takeover
REW<< is the solo moniker of Ryan E. Weber, who originally hails from the Western shores of Lake Michigan. His previous bands include Camden, The Promise Ring and Decibully, and he is one half of dream-pop duo Eric & Magill. In 2014 he released his acclaimed debut solo album as REW<<, Departeures, followed by Olive Skinned, Silver Tongued Sirens Sing Swan Songs in 2015, and On the Horns of Our Spheres in 2018.
Hidden Shoal MixTape
