This week’s Listening Party focuses on orchestral drone band Stars of The Lid, who will be performing their first concert in five years next week in a Brooklyn Basilica. Listening Party is a curated weekly column promoting music discovery and encouraging concert-going. Featuring someone we’ve been jamming out to and we recommend to the masses, each Listening Party artist has an upcoming show at a local NYC venue. Grab your headphones and read on.
WHO: Brian McBride and Adam Wiltzie
THEY SAY: “BEATLESS SOUNDSCAPES COMPOSED OF DRONING, EFFECTS-TREATED GUITARS ALONG WITH PIANO, STRINGS, AND HORNS; VOLUME SWELLS AND FEEDBACK FILL THE GAP OF RHYTHMIC INSTRUMENTS, PROVIDING DYNAMIC MOVEMENT WITHIN THE SONGS”
WE SAY: Epic, sweeping, beautiful, orchestral drone
FROM: Austin, TX
ONLINE: https://www.brainwashed.com/sotl/
LABEL: Kranky
RECENT WORK: 2013 Reissue of 1997’s The Ballasted Orchestra
UPCOMING SHOW: Next Tuesday, December 17th, with Wordless Music Orchestra at Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help ($30)
Stars of the Lid create classically sensible soundscapes, guided by shifts in note, tone, timbre and time following. The music they create can only be described as some of the most beautiful and relaxing drone music that’s ever existed. The cult duo first started releasing music in Austin in 1993 with the superb Music for Nitrous Oxide and have continued putting out similarly spaced out records since, their most recent being And Their Refinement of the Decline in 2007. Their name hints at their ability to transport a listener to another reality, one that hides within your mind – or in their words, ” “your own personal cinema, located between your eye and eyelid.” Stars of the Lid have provided the soundtrack to many of my most colorful and intricate dreams, soothing me through REM with undertones bellowing.
I simply cannot wait to see their performance next week – their first in five years – accompanied by the awesome Wordless Music Orchestra. The all ages show will reverberate stunningly in the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help church in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, put on by Le Poisson Rouge & Wordless Music. Get your tickets here before they run out!