Popstrangers sign to Rice Is Nice and announce new album 'In Spirit', out June 10, 2022.

Popstrangers are Joel Flyger (guitar/vocals), Adam Page (bass) and David Larson (drums), three native New Zealanders who now reside in London.

Popstrangers formed after meeting through mutual friends, with a shared interest in 80's New Zealand punk bands and most importantly, a desire to create music with like-minded people.

After releasing several singles on fabled New Zealand label Flying Nun, Popstrangers delivered their debut album Antipodes in 2013. Recorded in the basement of a 1930's dancehall, Antipodes features dissonant, claustrophobic melodies, anchored by the languid affectations of Flyger's vocals. Sophomore effort Fortuna soon followed in 2014, further developing the band's nuanced, distorted "pop" and released to much critical acclaim.

'In Spirit' is the excellent, long-awaited third LP from NZ/London trio Popstrangers, out June 10 2022. The record is led by its anthemic title track, premiered with FLOOD Magazine, who call it "sludgy and invigorating".

Speaking with FLOOD on the track, Popstrangers explain:

"In Spirit is written about the moment between giving in or getting on, about cutting through and not losing sight. Our bass player Adam Page filmed and edited this video on a few of his cameras around the Marshes in London and in an empty Karaoke room that hadn’t been in use due to the lockdowns at the time. He managed to gain access through a friend of a friend to shoot. We had the idea of making a video that would look like stock footage and projections that sit behind Karaoke songs. The fake karaoke video compliments the themes of inauthenticity in the song."

In Spirit was written over the summer of 2018-19 in rural New Zealand. Previously, vocalist Joel Flyger had been living and working in London for almost a decade. The UK’s capital, for all its exhilarating and bustling sensibilities, can feel like a bleak, filthy, chaotic backdrop to life for those raised in the antipodes. When Flyger returned to his homeland of New Zealand, he spent the summer helping a friend on a remote property in Waingaro, on New Zealand's West Coast. Inspired by the jarring shift from the constant overstimulation of capital cities to the isolation, beauty and stillness of the country's coastal towns, Flyger spent his after-work hours crafting the demos for what would become In Spirit.

Studio recording was completed between London and Auckland, New Zealand, by Thomas Healy (Tiny Ruins). Where Popstrangers’ previous output had leant heavily on sound manipulation and distortion, In Spirit sees the trio adopt a more relaxed, expansive approach to songwriting. The 10 track LP moves between moments of narcotic, undone softness to jarring noise, fluctuating between the two without ever really trying too hard. This is a record that explores ideas of movement, displacement, and relationships between people and environment.

'In Spirit' is Popstrangers’ first new release since 2014.

PRE-ORDER 'In Spirit' from our Bandcamp here

Popstrangers - In Spirit

1. Try Trust
2. Like Paper
3. In Spirit
4. Are Pigeons Doves?
5. Flood
6. No I.D.
7. Ain't Got You
8. Crack Track
9. Silhouette
10. Shine

New Zealand-born, Melbourne-based singer-songwriter Sarah Mary Chadwick announces her seventh full-length album, Me And Ennui Are Friends Baby, out February 5th, 2021 on Rice Is Nice Records (AUS/NZ/EU) and Ba Da Bing Records (US/EU), and today presents its lead single/video, “Every Loser Needs A Mother.”

Me And Ennui Are Friends, Baby will be released on LP with a bonus limited run of pink coloured vinyl. Accompanying a small number of the coloured vinyl will be a short run of alternate covers, individually hand-painted by Chadwick herself.

Comprised entirely of minimal solo piano arrangements, Ennui is despondently clear-eyed and smirkingly self-deprecating, completing a trilogy of records that started with 'The Queen Who Stole The Sky' and her only outing to date featuring a full band, 'Please Daddy'.

Each record has followed Chadwick’s internal processing after a traumatic event, with Chadwick’s zeal for psychoanalysis front and centre. On Ennui, Chadwick presents an exacting intensity with her choice to pare back to piano and vocals. It's in this stark setting that she focuses on the attempt she made on her life in 2019.

Just weeks before the Ennui recordings in 2019, Chadwick endured the breakup of a long term relationship and attempted her own life. These events followed the deaths of her father and a close friend, and it’s from this weighty internal mire that Chadwick emerges throughout the trilogy. Imaginably, the result is staggeringly abject.

However, the incandescent nature of her will, knack for reportage and searing dark humour sets fire to the world she describes over these 12 songs. Lead single “Every Loser Needs A Mother” offers a glimpse into this dark humour, as Chadwick describes an undesired need to take care of a dependant man: “Well I laid out his clothes // And I laughed at his jokes // And I stumbled around in // Heels and no clothes // And I went to his hell // And he kicked me out.” The track touches on all-too familiar tropes, Chadwick’s voice commanding and wryly confessional over piano.

The methods Chadwick employed on Ennui contrast those of her previous full-band record, which thrust her into a very different world of rehearsal, planning, restraint and control as a functional tool. The result, 2020’s critically acclaimed Please Daddy, was her most aching and engaging achievement to date: “a raw, often unnerving experience,” which “delivers compelling and uplifting catharsis” (Mojo). Recording Ennui shortly after the Please Daddy sessions, Chadwick concludes her trilogy by returning to the most immediate compositional process she can muster, doing it alone, with less between her and the microphone than ever before. Joined by long time production collaborators, Ennui was mastered by David Walker at Stepford Audio and mixed and recorded by Geoff O’Connor at Vanity Lair - both expertly bringing scale, subtlety and intangible ascendence to this recording. On Ennui, Chadwick is free, there is nowhere for her or us to run from the need to very presently and repeatedly articulate her trauma until it is simply, “articulated out.”

Additionally, a string of launches will be announced where Sarah will perform live to a small Melbourne crowd. These performances will be streamed live and will revolve around material from all three of the trilogy records. It will take place at a new Melbourne venue TBA, coinciding with an announcement about a series of continuous residency shows at this venue.

We are thrilled to announce 'Fall From Grace', the sophomore LP from powerhouse Rebel Yell, will be released through Rice Is Nice Records on July 10th.

PRE-ORDER ALBUM W/ LIMITED REBEL YELL MERCH HERE.

Grace Stevenson, the artist behind Rebel Yell, is self-reflexive and enquiring, and Fall from Grace encourages listeners to do more than shut up and dance. Fall from Grace is club music for the overthinker, a powerful cry to try and understand an increasingly confusing world through the body, beat and groove.

Using hard music to explore soft ideas – Rebel Yell gives a voice to the binaries that are present within all of us. Fall From Grace sees Stevenson tackle her own vulnerabilities, reworking them through the persona of Rebel Yell to create fresh, hypnotic and unapologetic techno that you ignore at your peril. This record is a testament to weathering our difficulties, emerging from them with a clearer picture of what we really stand for.

Lead single “Anti-Club Music” exemplifies the strength of material on the LP. Featuring R. T. FAX, the tongue-in-cheek track features prowling bass and mantric lyrics. Condensing the frustration of many nights dealing with shitty clubs and tech house bros, the central hook of “Too much groove” serves to remind that sometimes four-on-the-floor really is best.

Following the release of her debut album Hired Muscle in 2018, Rebel Yell toured Australia, Japan, the UK and Europe, linking up with fellow DIY creative forces and performing in underground venues and clubs across the world. 2019 saw Rebel Yell perform at Splendour In The Grass and Dark Mofo festivals, as well as countless national tours, before dedicating the remainder of the year to writing and recording her sophomore LP, Fall From Grace.

After receiving a grant from Music NSW to fund her new work, Stevenson shacked up in a remote area in the Blue Mountains, using the space and solitude to write what would become the foundations of Fall From Grace. Antonia Gauci was then brought on to produce and record the album and mastered by Phoebe Twigg (Ptwiggs).

If nothing else, maybe jumping around to this record while you’re stuck inside will be more fun than trying to find a workout video on YouTube that isn't so... perky. But beyond that, Fall from Grace serves two crucial purposes - as a shout of defiance against giving in to despair and complacency, and as a much-needed reminder that we will, one day, unite again.

"The song (Please Daddy), is a warning, a preamble, for what will likely be one of the most heartbreaking albums of the new decade." - Rolling Stone

"The album is not for the faint of heart, it’s for the fighters. Those who have been through hell and have come back to tell the tale" - Tone Deaf

To listen to Sarah’s music is to be a quiet observer to her thoughts on love, death and mental health.

Sometimes this anguish bears itself in sullen, quiet moments, but more often torment manifests at the break of Sarah’s voice as she sing-shouts painfully vulnerable, self-aware lyrics.

Her new album Please Daddy is out January 24th on Rice Is Nice Records (AU/NZ) and Sinderlyn Records (US). Listen to the devastatingly beautiful singles 'When Will Death Come' and 'Please Daddy' and pre-order your LP here - https://sarahmarychadwick.ffm.to/pleasedaddyalbum.opr

Sarah Mary Chadwick says of the song 'When Will Death Come' - "I tried to kill myself this year so maybe this song is too powerful". There is not much more that can be said and it's best to leave you with this second delivery of brilliance from Sarah Mary Chadwick.

"The unyielding motivation in Hill’s music,” Nat Hentoff writes in the liner notes to pianist Andrew Hill’s 1965 record Point of Departure, “is his desire to keep finding out who he is and to make his music out of that deepening knowledge.” Hentoff, Hill and liner notes are all dead, but it seems as though with some kind of spectral prescience they were summing up Sarah Mary Chadwick’s project, which takes place, seated at a piano, a half century later.

Indeed, it’s hard to think of a musical career today so dedicated to plumbing the depths, so unafraid to put its hand into the fire – now that “experiments” in music are clichés, and “emotion” is a post-ironic game of double-bluff. It’s for this reason that I need to offer a word of caution about this record – which should come affixed like those “Parental Advisories” which so reified the CDs which bore them.

This music is hard. Not in the sense of machismo or of complexity or of book-smarts or even tunelessness (there’s melodies for days), but in the sense that you will come into contact with great pain. It’s probably Sarah’s, but it might be yours, and as such this disc needs to be handled carefully, as though it glows with some kind of half-life accrued from traumas across a lifetime. Pain, indeed, is one of the ways we can go the deepest, like Fred Nietzsche says (and I’ll try not to over-intellectualise, the album doesn’t): “Only great pain, that long, slow pain that takes its time and in which we are burned, as it were, over green wood, forces us … to descend into our ultimate depths… I doubt that such pain makes us ‘better’ – but I know that it makes us deeper.”

And sometimes, for me at least, the music here is like being burned over “green wood,” like staying a little too late at the party, like sleeping a little too long in the middle of the day and waking up not knowing where you are.

But it’s a lot more than that – don’t worry. There’s joy here, lots of it, and humour too, which is another way we can go deep, if we know what we’re doing – and Sarah does. And what’s more there’s moments here that are neither funny nor tragic but both, like those tangled knots which make up the real stuff of our lives, like pet cemeteries, hangovers, or like the rope holding up the pants of one of Beckett’s old grubbers.

All this to say be careful, but have fun too – talking like a parent as you come down the stairs and head out to do who knows what – there’s riches to be found at the bottom of that muddy, icy water, but make sure you end up at somebody’s house, dried off with the heater on, drinking a brandy. That’s where Sarah’ll be, so don’t worry too much.

Summer Flake releases the third single from upcoming album 'Seasons Change'.

'Mind Reader' is everything we want from Summer Flake. The signature guitar, harmonies and powerful lyrics see Summer Flake deliver again with this captivating track.

"I know something isn’t right here / I can’t breathe"

Summer Flake, you kill us.

Recorded between studios and home, ‘Seasons Change’ sees the return of audio engineers Geoffrey O’Connor (The Crayon Fields, Sly Hats) and Evelyn Ida Morris (Pikelet), James Mannix returns on drums and Antony Bourmas on bass. Crase describes the album as having “more pace than my previous records - little flashes of optimism, upbeat moments, but still simmering with anxiety and panic, and the wobbling uncertain desire for change.

Produced during a 2 year period of personal, political and societal turbulence, 'Seasons Change' marks a point of timely personal introspection, looking backwards moving forwards. The recording process was marred by creative and personal struggles. Crase says "we rehearsed and recorded in fits and starts and long long pauses. So many plans were shredded and intentions inverted. I struggled with confidence, navigating how to realise my own vision, and connect with all the amazing creative people around me".

The new album 'Seasons Change' is lovingly delivered with the realisation that in the creative process you have to sometimes throw process and planning out the window. 'Seasons Change' tells a human story, one we all exist in together.

‘Seasons Change’, the third record from Summer Flake, will be released to the world via Rice Is Nice on August 30th.

Head to Bandcamp to get your LP of 'Seasons Change' now. First 100 pre-orders receive a very limited edition 7"!

'Adult Fantasy' is out now and had received critical acclaim for the likes of The Guardian, The Australian, 2SER's Album of the Week, Beat Magazine and more.

SPOD has also released a brand new video for his ode to lifelong commitment, 'Becomes A Wife'. The clip stars SPOD in his bejewelled showbiz jacket, alongside his best friend Conrad Greenleaf of Richard In Your Mind and Stressless fame.

Read The Guardian's long form feature on SPOD now!

Titled 'SPOD gets serious', the feature tracks SPOD's 25 year music career, and offers insightful commentary on the motivations behind it all. Check it out here.

The legends at RAGE have also been screening SPOD's TV Special on the telly, with the final chapter airing over the weekend. Thank you team RAGE!

What a time to be alive!

Summer Flake has dropped another spellbinding track, 'Hand In The Fire', the second single to be lifted from‘Seasons Change’, the much-anticipated third album from Steph Crase aka Summer Flake.

Recorded between studios and home, ‘Seasons Change’ sees the return of audio engineers Geoffrey O’Connor (The Crayon Fields, Sly Hats) and Evelyn Ida Morris (Pikelet), James Mannix returns on drums and Antony Bourmas on bass.

Crase describes the album as having “more pace than my previous records - little flashes of optimism, upbeat moments, but still simmering with anxiety and panic, and the wobbling uncertain desire for change.

Produced during a 2 year period of personal, political and societal turbulence, 'Seasons Change' marks a point of timely personal introspection, looking backwards moving forwards. The recording process was marred by creative and personal struggles. Crase says "we rehearsed and recorded in fits and starts and long long pauses. So many plans were shredded and intentions inverted. I struggled with confidence, navigating how to realise my own vision, and connect with all the amazing creative people around me".

The new album 'Seasons Change' is lovingly delivered with the realisation that in the creative process you have to sometimes throw process and planning out the window. 'Seasons Change' tells a human story, one we all exist in together.

‘Seasons Change’, the third record from Summer Flake, will be released to the world via Rice Is Nice on August 30th.

PRE-ORDER LP VIA BANDCAMP!

Australia’s most uncelebrated national treasure is touring and has a new single 'Make Things Right' to celebrate!

'Make Things Right' is a track about late nights, cold city streets, headlights spread through the fog, sirens splashing on the empty brick walls. Out on the streets, looking for your only son who’s old enough to make his own decisions, but young enough to not respect the consequences. How do you let go? When does having a good time become a bad time? Sure, he’ll learn from his mistakes, but what if it’s the ultimate lesson? That’s not the way this is going to play out, not on my watch.

This is the second video to be lifted from the forthcoming "Adult Fantasy TV Special” a live full-length performance video of 'Adult Fantasy'. Shot and edited LIVE direct to tape created by SPOD and Alex Smith. Pre-order your very own copy on VHS!

‘Adult Fantasy’ album launches are in sight, an evening with SPOD is soon to be yours, so from the man himself;

"My new album, Adult Fantasy is an ode to the delicate balance of life, keeping the drive to continue against the odds and to shine as bright as the morning sun while the reality is a subtle dusk falling upon the dampening fields of life. To celebrate this magnificent album, i’m taking it on the road to do what I do best and performing my sensual & powerful songs over a backing track to please and upset in equal measures. Playing a selection from Adult Fantasy, as well as my adored smash hits, with amazing supports and some great tricks up sleeve, you wont want to miss this because I don’t want to play to an empty room. See ya there?"

⚡ ⚡ ⚡ ADULT FANTASY ALBUM LAUNCH DATES! ⚡ ⚡ ⚡

Check all the dates here via Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/tours/2339612776105602/

Friday 26 July

The Lansdowne, Sydney

w/ support Bachelor Pad + more TBA

$10 + BF presale and $15 door

TIX HERE - https://spod-adult-fantasy-26jul.in-tix.com/

Sunday 28 July

North Gong Hotel, Wollongong

Yours & Owls Sundays

Free Entry

Saturday 10 August

The Tote Upstairs, Melbourne

w/ support from Nick Capper + Future Suck

$10 + presale and $15 door

TIX HERE - https://thetotehotel.oztix.com.au/outlet/event/80967e65-86b2-4ed2-b2db-b0d7b58b66aa

Saturday 24 August

The Foundry, Brisbane

w/ support from Whalehouse + Simi Lacroix + Young Trouble

$10 + BF presale and $15 door

TIX HERE - https://thefoundry.oztix.com.au/outlet/event/653b807f-a440-4adb-a91f-c978b075d1f9

Rice Is Nice + Summer Flake are proud to announce ‘Seasons Change’, the much-anticipated third album from Steph Crase aka Summer Flake. 'In The Dark' is the first single to be lifted from the forthcoming record. The song's playful drum breaks and big bold guitar riffs belie panicked rumination on how to find a way out of the gloom - a motif repeated throughout the album.

Summer Flake released their critically acclaimed debut LP ‘You Can Have It All’ via Rice Is Nice in 2013, following up with the lush, “melodic as fuck” sophomore album ‘Hello Friends’ in 2016. Now, we welcome the third chapter in Summer Flake’s brooding guitar pop trilogy.

Recorded between studios and home, ‘Seasons Change’ sees the return of audio engineers Geoffrey O’Connor (The Crayon Fields, Sly Hats) and Evelyn Ida Morris (Pikelet), James Mannix returns on drums and Antony Bourmas on bass.

‘Seasons Change’ sees Steph Crase consider ideas of self-identity, movement, and the indiscriminate yet deeply personal sense of yearning for growth. Following an organic, non-curated writing process, it was only with hindsight that Crase was able to realise the inter-connectedness of the themes present within the record, saying “I thought all the songs were such separate, free-standing, very different ideas. I’m slow to write, and usually just play with one idea at a time. I didn’t realise until near the end of production how tightly connected and repetitive the themes and lyrics were.”

Crase describes the album as having “more pace than my previous records - little flashes of optimism, upbeat moments, but still simmering with anxiety and panic, and the wobbling uncertain desire for change.

Produced during a 2 year period of personal, political and societal turbulence, 'Seasons Change' marks a point of timely personal introspection, looking backwards moving forwards. The recording process was marred by creative and personal struggles. Crase says "we rehearsed and recorded in fits and starts and long long pauses. So many plans were shredded and intentions inverted. I struggled with confidence, navigating how to realise my own vision, and connect with all the amazing creative people around me".

The new album 'Seasons Change' is lovingly delivered with the realisation that in the creative process you have to sometimes throw process and planning out the window. 'Seasons Change' tells a human story, one we all exist in together.

PRE-ORDER HERE!

Australia’s most uncelebrated national treasure has returned!

Rice Is Nice + SPOD are thrilled to present ‘Adult Fantasy’, the fourth studio album from SPOD, and his first full-length release in over five years.

SPOD has always been an artist that defies ‘easy’ categorisation. To understand the roots of the man and the myth, one must cast their minds back to 1995 - to a time in which two high school friends in Sydney were able to bond over a mutual admiration of Ween’s ‘Push Th’ Little Daisies’. With a borrowed four-track recorder, the pair looped grainy Beastie Boys beats onto a CD player, unknowingly drafting the beginnings of what would go on to become their new band, SPOD.

Evolving into a one man show, SPOD came of age within Sydney’s booming indie-electronic scene of the early 2000s. SPOD’s in your face live shows became synonymous with the musical landscape of the era, and were marked by an onslaught of a high energy, defiant ‘Up Yours’ attitude and crippling on stage honesty.

Now, SPOD is back, sitting somewhere between the cynicism of his youth and the impending doom and wisdom of old age.

Recorded in a self-built studio within a broken-down bus in Tasmania, ‘Adult Fantasy’ stays true to SPOD’s DIY creative process, one that he describes as “just open the gate and hang on for dear life”. The stunning album artwork is an original portrait painted by Tasmanian artist Zina Kurtschenko.

‘Adult Fantasy’ ruminates on the joys and pitfalls of growing older, and sees SPOD adopt a lyrical poignancy that journeys from the romance and sexual energy of making a life-long commitment, looking after yourself, fearing for your loved ones, getting online and a general terror of our mindless march into a political apocalypse.

'Sexual Fantasy' is the first single to be taken from the new record. A song about ways love can survive in the long stretch of a committed relationship. Keeping that candle alight, keeping the fantasy alive. Sensitivity, respect, passion. That’s the ticket! The kids are at Grandmas, the dogs are fed, work can wait. This secret is ours.

This special video clip for 'Sexual Fantasy' is taken from SPOD's upcoming "Adult Fantasy TV Special” a live full-length performance video of 'Adult Fantasy'. Shot and edited LIVE direct to tape created by SPOD and Alex Smith. Pre-order your very own copy on VHS here!

We are lucky enough to have Weirdo Wasteland are premiering the video right here, right now!

‘Adult Fantasy’ concludes with the finale track ‘Golden Gaytime’, which is a contender for The Guinness World Record for most special guests within one song. Some featured include; Henry Rollins, Jason Lytle (Grandaddy), DZ Deathrays, DJ Douggpound (Doug Lussenhop) Jack Ladder, John Early, Vic Berger IV, Ariel Pink, Stella Mozgawa, Rebel Yell and many more.

'Adult Fantasy’ is about accepting the inevitable fate of life, celebrating the march alone through the dark abyss of time, and of growing up and growing down, simultaneously.

‘Adult Fantasy’, the fourth album from the genius that is SPOD, will be released worldwide on July 19th via Rice Is Nice.

Straight Arrows guest programmed RAGE March 23 2019. Here are some sweet cuts. ON TOP is OUT NOW! www.riceisnice.net

Richard In Your Mind guest programmed RAGE on Feb 9 2019. New album Super Love Brain is out now! www.riceisnice.net