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LP
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NJB 001LP
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LP version. HTRK mint their N&J Blueberries label with a startling fifth studio album, finding the duo stripped to a quietly cathartic quintessence of heartbreaking vocals and spectral webs of guitar in a modern, classic and wholly inimitable style. Recorded in their native Dandenong Ranges, Australia, during April-May 2021, Rhinestones contains some of HTRK's most aching/gratifying songwriting secreted in subtly plangent sheets of dubbed guitar, synth pads and ember crackling 808s. It's an album that seems to have been precision-tooled for tortured romantics and atomized souls, reverberating with a gentle pathos and unfurling at an effortless pace that's practically therapeutic. Distilling their form of lowkey emotional manipulations to a fine art, the metaphysical soul of their songcraft somehow bleeds out more clearly than ever, infusing every song from the heartbreak pucker of "Kiss Kiss and Rhinestones" to the intoxicating, spirit-catcher sway of "Gilbert and George" with the tumescent glow of MDMA-tingled flesh and the uncanniest air of déjà vu. All nine songs land like a salve to the senses with a micro-dosed sensitivity that reveals every shimmering string, pad and echoic snare contrail like a halo around Jonnine's incredible vocals, which regale tales of love and the mysteries of the night with an observant, diaristic directness that has an unshakeable emotive clout. In key with the times, the songs feel like the soundtrack to emptied cities, casting gothic shadows in the spellbinding reverbs of "Valentina" and mottled beauty of "Siren Song", with the fragged ketrock of "Fast Friend" imagining a séance with Prince and Anna Domino, while Conrad Standish (CS + Kreme) lends bass guitar gilding to the saloon sashay of "Real Headfuck", and "Straight To Hell" basks in a transition between the golden and crepuscular hours. Oh -- and "Sunlight Feels like Bee Stings" -- what a title?! Put plainly, no other band do it quite like HTRK, and Rhinestones feels like their purest iteration, conjured in a mist of feeling, love and inebriation. Mixed by Nigel Yang. Design by Jonnine Standish.
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CD
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NJB 001CD
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HTRK mint their N&J Blueberries label with a startling fifth studio album, finding the duo stripped to a quietly cathartic quintessence of heartbreaking vocals and spectral webs of guitar in a modern, classic and wholly inimitable style. Recorded in their native Dandenong Ranges, Australia, during April-May 2021, Rhinestones contains some of HTRK's most aching/gratifying songwriting secreted in subtly plangent sheets of dubbed guitar, synth pads and ember crackling 808s. It's an album that seems to have been precision-tooled for tortured romantics and atomized souls, reverberating with a gentle pathos and unfurling at an effortless pace that's practically therapeutic. Distilling their form of lowkey emotional manipulations to a fine art, the metaphysical soul of their songcraft somehow bleeds out more clearly than ever, infusing every song from the heartbreak pucker of "Kiss Kiss and Rhinestones" to the intoxicating, spirit-catcher sway of "Gilbert and George" with the tumescent glow of MDMA-tingled flesh and the uncanniest air of déjà vu. All nine songs land like a salve to the senses with a micro-dosed sensitivity that reveals every shimmering string, pad and echoic snare contrail like a halo around Jonnine's incredible vocals, which regale tales of love and the mysteries of the night with an observant, diaristic directness that has an unshakeable emotive clout. In key with the times, the songs feel like the soundtrack to emptied cities, casting gothic shadows in the spellbinding reverbs of "Valentina" and mottled beauty of "Siren Song", with the fragged ketrock of "Fast Friend" imagining a séance with Prince and Anna Domino, while Conrad Standish (CS + Kreme) lends bass guitar gilding to the saloon sashay of "Real Headfuck", and "Straight To Hell" basks in a transition between the golden and crepuscular hours. Oh -- and "Sunlight Feels like Bee Stings" -- what a title?! Put plainly, no other band do it quite like HTRK, and Rhinestones feels like their purest iteration, conjured in a mist of feeling, love and inebriation. Mixed by Nigel Yang. Design by Jonnine Standish.
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LP
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BKEDIT 019LP
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The mighty HTRK follow-up their recent Venus in Leo album with Over The Rainbow, their debut soundtrack for Jeremy Piexoto's 2019 Scientology documentary. A rare and unexpected all-instrumental showreel by the shoegaze pop duo, their suite of original music is testament to a haunting soul that's long lurked under the hood of their singular, hugely evocative sound. Effectively a sort of dream come true for HTRK's legion disciples, the soundtrack strips away their signature vocals and drum machines in a commission to fit the mood of Piexoto's feature -- a film that seeks to better understand Scientology through a range of perspectives, from psychologists to former members. HTRK use their considerable knack for conjuring haunting, heavy-lidded feels and ohrwurm hooks to map the mood, deploying a trademark, incisive sense of detachment that colors the film's intersection of real beliefs and ideas of Scientology as a sect. In the absence of Jonnine Standish's vocals and Nigel Yang's 808 boom, HTRK's musick is pared to its essence of synths, guitars and electronics and painted in hazy, illusive strokes from a palette of smudged pastels mutual to both South California and the band's native Australia. The result is a 13 part mosaic tiling hazy blue cues with aqueous ambient pads and baroque themes, playing out like the atmospheric strokes to LA noir in a way that silhouettes the film's probing narrative and rhetoric and also reflects its fascination with American culture and the supernatural in a similar way to Eno's ambient classics or Lynch flicks and their scores. Ultimately Over The Rainbow is an instant play-it-again entry to HTRK's catalog, one that supplies a sort of crystal ball window onto their practice and most subtly illuminates the duo's masterful control of tonal sensitivity and floating, chamber-like composition. RIYL: classic ambient music from the likes of Pinkcourtesyphone, Gigi Masin, AFX, Eno. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplate & Mastering, Berlin. Sleeve printed on matt laminate card stock; Edition of 500.
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12"
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PTYT 012EP
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A mysterious three-piece from Melbourne, HTRK (pronounced "Hate Rock") exercise sublime tension and beauty, calling to mind David Lynch, The Birthday Party and Pita. "Ha" is the lead song off their forthcoming album, a 21st century tribal disco lament that signals the shape of things to come. "Panties" is a visceral outpouring recorded live in Belfast at the end of their 2007 European tour supporting the Liars.
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