FEATURE:
Spotlight
Another Sky
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I have said it in previous outings of Spotlight…
but the band market is one I have ignored for a while. I have always been more attuned to solo artists however, this year, there are some terrific bands emerging that have turned my head! Though Another Sky have been playing for a few years now, the fact their debut album is coming very soon is a big reason to highlight that – I shall end the feature talking about that. From the sumptuous, almost choir-like vocals to the delicate piano, All Ends is a song that suggests the album, I Slept on the Floor, is going to be one of the best from 2020! It is a bit early to say this, but I would not be surprised if the album is nominated for a Mercury Prize next year – the shortlist for this year’s prize has just been announced. In Catrin Vincent, Another Sky has an amazing vocalist: shades of London Grammar’s Hannah Reid can be heard, yet Vincent is much more haunting and striking, I feel. So, then…who are the band? Here is some useful biography:
“When you listen to Another Sky, it’s probably Catrin Vincent’s voice that’ll catch your attention first. It is a weapon – peculiar, androgynous, lurching and defiant – that she wields to beautiful, evocative effect. When Guardian music critic Caroline Sullivan saw the band perform at The Great Escape this year, she tweeted, “I'm almost dumbstruck by the singer – she has the strangest, most haunting voice I've heard in ages.” Catrin is delighted that people find it so strange. “A lot of people think I’m a man,” she laughs. “I think people are embarrassed when they initially think it’s one of the guys singing, but I love it. It’s like I’ve got two voices – there’s this soft, whispery voice that can go really high, and then suddenly there’s this angry chest voice. Somewhere along the way, I drew two voices together.”
Catrin’s unusual vocals certainly caught the attention of her future bandmates – drummer Max, bassist Naomi and guitarist Jack – when they were studying music together at Goldsmiths University. Before they came together to form Another Sky (which is named after an Emily Dickinson poem), “we were all just drifting,” says Catrin. But as soon as they found each other, something clicked. “We started by jamming, and songs would come out of just hours of jamming. Then I would put the melody and lyrics down. It’s really collaborative, no-one’s really in charge. I think that’s the best thing about it.”
Their varied but complimentary tastes helped create their inimitable sound. Max was inspired by electronic artists such as Four Tet and Bonobo; Naomi’s bass lines were influenced by Mutemath and Radiohead; Jack drew from bands like Coldplay and Talk Talk, and Catrin most connected to storytellers like Joni Mitchell. When they rehearsed, they would do so in total darkness. “The studio was on the main New Cross road, where ambulances and police cars go past all the time, and there was this really high window. You’d be in total silence and darkness, but there’d be blue lights flashing past. It was a gorgeous, atmospheric environment.” Until recently, they performed in darkness too. “I think it was just to place the focus completely on the music,” says Catrin, “so it wasn’t this spectacle of me being the singer at the front. We wanted to be anonymous, and just make it all about the music.” Now, they’re willing to let themselves be a little more visible – they’re no longer anonymous, and they show themselves on stage, albeit in silhouette – but that darkness still firmly resides in the music”.
I have been listening back to Another Sky’s previous work, and I am amazed by how far they have come. They were simply amazing to start, but their music has become even brilliant as time has progressed. If you need a band to follow that will, no doubt, unveil one of the year’s finest albums, then tilt your head in the direction of Another Sky. Looking online, and there is not as much press and kudos out there as there should be, in terms of spotlighting. I think Another Sky are going to go a very long way, and they are primed for massive success; I think they will definitely establish a big market in the U.S. Last year, in their ‘Class of 2020’ series, DIY spent some time promulgating the wonder of Another Sky:
“It’s not often that an unknown new band finds themselves plonked into the infamous rotating cast of Later… with Jools Holland, in amongst jazz supremos and chart-toppers. But back in October last year, that’s exactly where Another Sky made their first break into the public consciousness. Needless to say, it was a bit of a moment.
It’s in the time since, however, that the London-based quartet have found themselves growing all the more powerful. While they were quick off the blocks with a series of dynamic and intoxicating tracks – including the tirade against the 1% of the darkly driven ‘Chillers’ - it’s been over the last twelve months that they’ve spent time building themselves into an even more intense prospect.
“It’s just been non-stop, really,” reflects front woman Catrin Vincent. “We really had to get down and grind, as they say. Or no one says… I’ve never heard that before in my life!” she laughs. “We’re all still working, so it’s literally been [about] every chance we get, being in the studio, practicing for gigs, going on tour…”
A quick glance across their recent gig schedule and social media proves as much. Alongside the release of second EP ‘Life Was Coming In Through The Blinds’, the quartet have spent much of their year performing on both sides of the Atlantic. “[We went on] a US tour which was actually quite successful,” she continues. “We didn’t think anyone would turn up at the shows, but then there were people singing the lyrics. That was really, really cool”.
Looking at the band’s social media channels, and they are pumped the album is just around the corner and, more than a debut album, it seems like this has been a real dream for them. It will be interesting to see how their sound expands into a full release, as E.P.s such as Life Was Coming in Through the Blinds (released last year) showed immense promise. That E.P. was one that I heard and fell in love with! It gained some positive reviews and, as this one shows, their music is immersive and affecting, and it does reward repeated listens:
“The EP contains their two previous singles, the wonderful ‘Apple Tree‘ and ‘The Cracks’ alongside the EP’s title track and ‘ I Don’t Hate You’
The title track is probably their most disorientating track to date, and it does take a few listens to actually grasp it, it’s a swirling sonic soundscape that completely envelopes the senses. The EP finishes with the darkly brooding cinematic ‘ I Don’t Hate You’ which kind of sums up the Ep’s ethos which focuses on resilience and celebration in the darkest of times, loosely inspired by ‘The Wisdom Of No Escape’, by Pema Chodron. It also represents the next stage in Another Sky’s development as they continue to push the boundaries, challenges the listener’s expectations and in doing so make a sound that is uniquely their own”.
This sort of takes us to the here and now. The band have some gigs planned for later this year and next year, and I do hope they get to fulfill them, as their music is gaining a lot of traction, and they have an ever-growing fanbase behind them. I love their sound, and it has a dreaminess and weight that definitely remains in the mind and gets into the blood. I Slept on the Floor is going to be one of the most-anticipated albums of 2020, and I cannot wait to see the reviews pour forward. Go to the band’s official website to pre-order your copy now. DIY caught up with the band in June as they were preparing to release the single, Fell in Love with the City:
“Woohoo! Another Sky have announced that their debut album ‘I Slept On The Floor’ is set to land on 7th August via Fiction Records, and they’re sharing brand new single ‘Fell In Love With The City’ to celebrate too!
Speaking on the new single, Catrin Vincent explains, “I hate breakup songs. I don’t know why, it’s the most universal feeling. Maybe because the world has so many of them. Moving to London was a dramatic shift from small-town life where it didn’t even occur to me I could do music, where this vision of me as a housewife who never amounted to anything felt inescapable, in to a bigger world, of people from all over, of new ideas and a new version of myself.”
Talking more about the album, Catrin also shared the following statement,
“People say I sound like a man. Maybe that means they’ll listen.
‘I Slept On The Floor’ is an amalgamation of the ever-shifting life I have shared with Another Sky over the last six years, searching for resolution between my hometown-self and the self a new city brought me. It was why in 2017, at St. Pancras Church, Another Sky performed in the dark as silhouettes, big illuminated circles behind each of us.
People left asking if the singer was a woman or a man. I wanted to ask why it mattered.
I wanted the band to be a mirror, reflecting the darkness back at itself. I thought I had found myself in that darkness.
I grew up in a white picket fence town with a fear of beds, preferring to sleep on the floors of bathrooms in case I got sick at night. My anxiety was so suppressed, so unacknowledged by my environment that my body broke to get my attention. I became very unwell. My body tried to tell me, “you can’t mould yourself into their ideal,” but I didn’t know there was an alternative. I was malleable soil instead, filling a vase, growing into a shape I couldn’t see.
You can’t see the walls around you if they look like the edges of the Universe.
In 2013, I moved to London and thought I’d found a bigger, better vase. Suddenly I was exploding into a world of a million possibilities, but rather than finding myself bursting at the seams, I couldn’t find the edges of myself at all.
Just as my hometown had shaped me, so did London begin to. Among the rising rents and an increasingly hostile political landscape, the pressure to define my limits grew. The world didn’t stop breaking me down just because I had moved on from the confines of my childhood.
I Slept On The Floor documents the childhood rejection we carry with us into adulthood. This album is about only understanding a place once you’ve left it”.
I wish the band the best of success, but I am sure they will not need it! Their music is phenomenal, and they will only get stronger as the years go by. I feel their debut album is one you cannot afford to miss out on. If you need a new band to follow, then I think you can’t go wrong with the mighty Another Sky. This simply amazing act are preparing to release a stunning debut album, and I just know there is going to be a lot of success for them…
ON the horizon.
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