aaamusic | On 20, Aug 2011

A Winged Victory For The Sullen Release Video + Free Mp3, Debut Album Out 12th September On Erased Tapes

New Project From Former Sparklehorse Musician and Stars Of The Lid Founder Adam Wiltzie

www.awvfts.com
www.erasedtapes.com

“at that quiet intersection where modern classical and ambient meet post-rock…You won’t feel sullen after you hear this, you’ll feel victorious” The Guardian

Following on from a recent announcement about their imminent debut album, drone/neo-classical artists A Winged Victory For The Sullen have released a video and free download.
The eponymous debut is the first installment of the new collaboration between Stars Of The Lid founder Adam Wiltzie and LA-based composer Dustin O’Halloran, set for release via Erased Tapes on the 12th September in the UK. ‘A Winged Victory For The Sullen’ also features guest musicians Icelandic cellist Hildur Gudnadottir, as well as Erased Tapes label comrade Peter Broderick on violin.
Watch the video featuring the final string quartet recording sessions from ‘A Winged Victory For The Sullen’ at the historic DDR radio studios in Berlin, August 2010

A Winged Victory For The Sullen – DDR Studios Trailer from Erased Tapes on Vimeo.

Download album track ‘Steep Hills Of Vicodin Tears’

A Winged Victory For The Sullen – Steep Hills Of Vicodin Tears by erasedtapes

On May 24th 2007, in Bologna, Italy, Adam was on tour and playing with the late Mark Linkous and his beloved Sparklehorse, on what would be their final European tour. That night Adam invited friend and colleague Francesco Donadello to see the concert, and Francesco’s guest this evening was composer Dustin O’Halloran (Sofia Coppola’s ‘Marie Antoinette’ O.S.T.). Through a strange twist of backstage conversations surrounding passport cache conundrums, and love of Italian gastronomy, a curious friendship began that now has brought forth an offspring of truly curative compositions for the world to savour.
Hear ‘Requiem For The Static King Part One’ streamed in full below. The track was created in memory of the untimely passing of Mark Linkous:

A Winged Victory For The Sullen – Requiem For The Static King Part One by erasedtapes

The duo agreed to leave the comfort zone of their home studios and develop the recordings with the help of large acoustic spaces, hunting down a selection of 9ft grand pianos that had the ability to deliver extreme sonic low end. Other traditional instrumentation was used including string quartet, French horn, and bassoon, but always juxtaposed is the sound of drifting guitar washed melodies. The recordings began with one late night session in the famed Grunewald Church in Berlin on a 1950s imperial Bösendorfer piano and strings were added in the DDR radio studios along the River Spree. One last session on a handmade Fazioli piano in a private studio on the Northern cusp of Italy, before the final mixes took place in a 17th century villa near Ferrara with the assistance of Francesco Donadello. All songs were then processed completely analogue straight to magnetic tape. Their secret to harvesting new melodic structures from the thin air of existence was for the duo to push themselves to dangerous territory, realising that clear thinking at the wrong moment could stifle the compositions.
The final result is seven landscapes of harmonic ingemination. In ‘Requiem For The Static King Part One’ they have taken the age-old idea of a string quartet and then shot it out of a cannon to reveal exquisite new levels of sonic bliss. Of the 13 minute track ‘Symphony Pathétique’, Wiltzie says ‘after almost 20 years of struggling to create interesting ambient drone music, I feel like I have finally figured out what I am doing’. A Winged Victory For The Sullen is not a side project – it is the future of the late night record you have always dreamed of.

TRACK LISTING:

WE PLAYED SOME OPEN CHORDS AND REJOICED, FOR THE EARTH HAD CIRCLED THE SUN YET ANOTHER YEAR
REQUIEM FOR THE STATIC KING PART ONE
REQUIEM FOR THE STATIC KING PART TWO
MINUET FOR A CHEAP PIANO NUMBER TWO
STEEP HILLS OF VICODIN TEARS
A SYMPHONY PATHETIQUE
ALL FAREWELLS ARE SUDDEN