Raven Beats Crow – Zola Budd EP
aaamusic | On 07, Oct 2010
Raven beats Crow
Zola Budd EP
1. Escalator
2. dead.com
3. So Long Pogo
4. S.U.N.
5. Chrome Yellow
Birdhide Records
22nd November 2010
Emerging from their coup for the first time in nearly a year, Raven beats Crow present this – the Zola Budd EP – with a heightened sense of both night vision and sonic awareness.
Recorded by the band themselves in their now obligatorily tagged Birdhide studio, and mixed by Chris Shaw (Super Furry Animals, Animal Collective) and Justin Premen (Klaxons, Bloc Party), the blend is everything that brought attention to the four Londoners in the first place.
Playing off their eccentric and idiosyncratic personalities (and alter-egos – note the live garms), bouncing from Pulp-style modern disco rhythms and the post-psychedelic, electronics led noodlings of Hot Chip, the Zola Budd EP is as perfect an envelope of the band that they have offered to date. From the moulded, fluorescent plasticines of ‘Escalator’, to the vocoded beauty of ‘S.UN.’, there’s something to sate near every palette here.
Raven beats Crow’s live reputation has grown in wingspan since the inception of their old Club Raven nights out of Chalk Farm. Attention-rousing performances at Alan McGee’s Death Disco and the legendary Playground nights in east London have certified the band as one of London underground’s most interesting tickets; their combination of hypnotic live visuals, animalistic facemasks and jarring agit-pop make for quite the delirious and disorientating spectacle.
The band have, also, recently had ‘Puncture Kit’ from their Pantheon of Stars EP featured on the Breaking Rocks compilation – a release in support of the Jail Doors Initiative set up by Billy Bragg.
The EP will be both performed and it’s release celebrated with a special performance from the band at The St. Andrew’s Crypt, Holborn, London on October 14th where the band will perform live in amongst a selection of interactive installations and unique, esoteric visuals from some of London’s most up-and-coming artists.
