Brakes Are Back!

Brakes return next month with a brand new 11-track studio album entitled Beatific Visions. The follow up to last years Give Blood will be released on November 8th through Rough Trade. I've just heard a copy of it and have to say it doesnt dissapoint. Its certainly a step up from their debut - with more focused, rounded songs. A highlight for me is Spring Chicken. Great stuff.

A statement from the band follows....

Brakes are the rollin', bowlin', tumblin', toilin', boilin', wheelin', bleedin', blood givin' buddies that have been throwing eyes into the valleys of the blind and sending mp3s to the moon or further for over three years now YEAH!!! Roll over cold dog' cause a hot dog's movin' in!! HELL YEAH!!!

So far this year, Brakes backed Belle and Sebastian and Editors in the UK & Europe before seeing in the spring with trips to warmer climbs; March saw the band head to Texas for a string of successful shows at the South by South West festival in Austin, a return to NYC and a debut tour of Italy.

Come April and Brakes' super-duper smash hit 'All Night Disco Party' received a repeat release disguised in Graham Sutton, Matthew Herbert and FC Kahuna remix formats. The band then toured from Aberdeen all the way down to the city of London where they did a good job of filling the popular Mean Fiddler venue.

It was high time for Brakes II by now, so, on an invitation from Seth Riddle (husband of Cerys Mathews) they flew to Nashville, Tennessee to record with Stuart Sikes (Cat Power: The Greatest, White Stripes: Red Blood Cells...) After a few days acclimatisation; catching fireflys; drinking 45 ounce margheritas; swapping guitar licks and rocking on rocking chairs on various porches, they got to work at The House of David studio, where records have been made by the likes of JJ Cale, Yo La Tengo and Elvis Presley.

The band stuck to their old habits by recording fast and live to tape. They recruited a few extra pairs of hands in the shape of local axe hombre Kevin Teel (lapsteel) and the man of 'The House' himself, Mr David Briggs (piano) David was an original Muscle Shoals band member and went on to play piano with Elvis between '68 and '77. Brakes asked him to lay down some 'ragtime' piano on 'If I Should Die Tonight' offering him $10. "Well, that was worth 50c." he said. They squeezed in gigs at the legendary record shop 'Grimeys' and its sister venue The Basement in between sessions, and were greeted by Nashville with hollers, whoops and screams.

Between festivals around the UK and Europe, Brakes mixed their new album 'Beatific Visions' at Radiohead's studio, Courtyard, in Oxfordshire. They paid their dues at the grave of Eric Blair (George Orwell), drank too much at the local mind bending pub 'The Plough', recorded a string section and mixed a fine record, which was later mastered by Neil Young's mastering engineer in Nashville.

The band played festivals until the end of the summer, and will be out on tour somewhere near you soon.

'The Beatific Visions' Tracklisting:

Hold Me In The River
Margarita
If I Should Die Tonight
Mobile Communication
Spring Chicken
Isabel
Beatific Vision
Porcupine or Pineapple
Cease and Desist
On Your Side
No Return

The band are touring the album in December with the following dates. Tickets are available at usual outlets.

Oct 16	White Heat @ Luminaire - more info
Oct 23	Trash @ The End (10pm-3am)
Oct 26	Adventures In The Beetroot Field @ Fabric
Nov 9	Another Music = Another Kitchen @ Proud Galleries
Nov 28	The Point
Nov 29	Crawdaddy
Nov 30	Radar Club @ Speakeasy
Dec 1	King Tuts
Dec 2	Cockpit
Dec 3	Roadhouse
Dec 4	Bar Academy
Dec 5	Kings College
Dec 8	Pavilion Theatre