Winter Hymns in the Dark

Hello,

Much has been happening in the io camp.

1. One more song to write for our follow up, and thats half there. Looks like the record will clock in at about 45mins. Which will be just enough time for your morning commute. If you're commute is shorter, you can listen to it on the way home. Longer? Listen to it twice, the second time louder.

2. Stu has a new pedal, a E-H POG. He keeps putting it on everthing. Between that and my HOG everything will sound like a scary organ.

3. We're gonna record these new 'jams' in January and get that mastered soon after and aim for a Spring 2010 release. Thinking of Alan Douches for the mastering (Mastodon, Shapes, other people who I can't remember).

4. We're all going to the MBV ATP soon. I'm also going to the 10 years one. So say hi. I'll be the one who is a mess with the other guys holding me up.

Listening to:
New stuff from Beak, Lightning Bolt, Do Make Say Think, Baroness, Converge, Om, Shrinebuilder, Part Chimp , Fuck Buttons. Also rocking some El-P because its TOO GOOD!

Al xx

Progress and stuff

Hey there,

Long time no, blog. Been busy beavering away. Played a couple of shows, together with a great show (albeit to not many people) at the Hare and Hounds. Hubble Constant were awsome too, pictures can be found http://www.flickr.com/wayne_john_fox.

Gig-wise we have 2 in 2 week action, both at the Flapper. The 16th of October sees us rocking with Maybeshewill and Cats&Cats&Cats. The 24th is Oxjam gig with some ace acts (Shapes, Death of London and loads of others). There's loads of gigs going on around Brum on that day and its £6 for them all. No excuse. Flyers shortly.

xxx

New Song aCtiON!

Yep! We've been hiding in Derby for 3 days rocking with cocks firmly in trousers and have come back with 4 stonking tracks that will form half of our next record. You can listen to one of them, 'This Is Only A Dress Rehersal" over at myspace www.myspace.com/weareio . its not mastered yet but you get the idea, idea? IDEA. Not ikea.

Show tonight at Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath. Super duper!

x

A sunny day off

After a busy weekend I (Stu) have decide to take a day off, and the weathers lovely, so why I'm sitting indoors on the computer I'm not sure...

We played a couple of shows over the last couple of days which turned out really well. First was a show in Birmingham at the Old Wharf. It's a cool little venue with a cracking PA, although the beers a bit hit and miss. We played with Maybeshewill and And So I Watch You From Afar, who were both excellent. We road tested a new song (working title 'We are the new Batmen') which went well. The gig had a really good vibe and hopefully everyone who came down had as much fun as we did.

We then headed up to Leicester for Whitenoise Summer festival at Firebug. I don't think the weather could've been any better, we spent a bit of time in the park kicking a football round both Sat and Sun. Some guys challenged us to a game but they were bigger and fitter than us (and not full of a greasy fry up) so we declined. There were some great bands on such as the two mentioned above, Death of London, Theo and Her name is Calla. There was a good crowd overall, and it's brilliant to see so many people supporting the leicester scene. Kudos to the organisers, looking forward to the Christmas one already.

I got talking to Theo after his set about aluminum neck guitars, he plays a Kramer (although I can't remember the model). They're still hard to find but generally cheaper than Travis Bean guitars and the sound doesn't have quite so much top end. I'm going to keep my eye out for one.

No gigs till July for us now, we're still writing but the songs are coming along, we need a couple more for the album. We've also been discussing ideas for artwork and themes and I'm really excited by some of the things we've come up with.

Currently listening to the new Isis, new Sunn 0))) and new and so I watch you from afar, all come highly recommended.

Right I'm off to enjoy the sun

x

Post-ATP...

It's been a week since got back from ATP v Fans and these things were good:
Not driving (thank you tom)
Texican Whopper
Grails, Sleep, Health, Electric Wizard, Beirut, Harvey Milk
Andrew WK being really, really odd.
The Wire and that wierd awsome show. Good job.
Also the gorgoroth documentry.
Dancing on sunday.

Bad:
Grouper-disappointing, she seemed so bloody moody
Falling asleep for half the jesus lizard even though I loooove them. Damn.
Marnie Stern, got the chops but damn is she annoying.
No party anthems.
Vomiting alot on sunday.

The other guys just got back from t'other one so I'm sure they'll make a list.

Two new songs coming along, ones mathy one is metally. Both will probably end up math-metal-noise or something.

Two new pedals will be with me soon, Moog MF-105 Murf and EH Hog. Oh yeah!

Come to this:


xxx

Into May...

Hizzle.

So it's may time. We all went out for a special 2 course meal at lunchtime yesterday. 5.95, bargain. Kari Beef for me! Love bank holidays, also bought some more comics. Grant Morrison frenzy.

Finished new song, so thats four done. Started another new one, crazy tapping and riffs aplenty. We also have a facebook group here so go to it and join in the fun.

We are also ATPing it up the next couple of weeks. So say hi if you see me (al) at the vs the fans or hello to stu, dave and steve at the breeders (they're older, therefore they go to that one). So excited for Sleep, and andrew WK omg lmao LOLZ.

Ten horned beast, get in!


xxx

Start of Summer!

Hey all. Amazing weather, was in the Lake district for 3 days so I've recoverd some sense of hearing as it meant 3 days without guitar feedback and loud headphones. Been back two days and already sorted that out. New mastodon and mono albums cranked and also been rocking TOO much envy than is healthy. I'm getting angry in japanese.
Also, THOR'S HAMMER at Supersonic, SOMA and Anderson rocking out past 11. Cannot wait.

Io news. Amazing show at the actress and then a great (although drunken show!) at with Death of London in leicester. Bit of a break until May now. Writing the new tracks, new(er) ones coming along well. So far the albums shaping up as:
5 Ton Man
This is where the cat lives
Tropicana in the organ
New one

So probably need a 2 or 3 more. Artworks being done by Hanna. Check her link over b'theeer.

Baroness next friday? Oh yeah! x

1st show in ages

Got io's first show with Mr Steve playing bass today. Actress and Bishop in brum, should be a good one. Kinda strange that we haven't been playing for ages and me and Stu chose last night to restring our guitars and reassemble our pedal boards. We used alot of no-more-nails. Did feel abit stupid to no-more-nails some velcro onto a £100 tremelo pedal (a stupid price for a tremelo pedal!) just to get it to stick to some other velcro. Ah well, hope it stays put. Also be doing a new song, '5 ton man' for the first time tonight. Starts with me screaming. Be a bit of a shock to those who didn't see our 3 shows in the summer.
Set list:
5 ton man
this is where the cat lives
where we're going we don't need roads
tropicana in the organ

see you there lovies



currently rocking:
down
no age
lil'wayne
neon neon
oren ambarchi
johan johanson
deerhunter
grouper

Just one note...

Wish I had time/money to get to these Grimm Robe shows. Interested how many amps SOMA has, since he must still have all these Sunn Model-Ts lying around and now he's playing HiWatt Custom 100s and Fender Twins. Anyway, I'll make do with my one Marshall TSL-100 which incidently is actually playing up.

On my Ipod A-Z I'm up to D finally. Which meant a converge marathon yesterday. Feeling pumped.
xx

Begin

In thinking of a witty title for this, I typed in 'Begin' into wikipedia, hopeing for some help. However, I got a list of (almost entirely) Israeli and Canadian politicians. I never knew there was such a link between the two countries. Wierd. Anyway, I'm just gonna use this for my reviews of things, what I've been doing and sound manipulation news (whatever that is).

Had some cool news this week, in that a great Belgian label called Consouling Sounds wants to release the follow up to my band's, io, first album. So another part of this blog will be how the writing, demoing etc of that is going. We have 3 songs already, need another 4. Go us.

Just read an amazing review of two records. One by Emeralds on No Fun records which was descrived as:

"manages to soar between the elevated electronics of Tangerine Dream and the religious effect of Popol Vuh in one succinct sweep of synths, rising to a spine melting crescendo after 6 minutes and opening your soul for the rest of the session. 'Damaged Kids' is initially part Wolf Eyes horror ambient and part Delia Derbyshire radiophonics, exploring the outer limits of their gears spooking capabilities before turning into a lush swell of krautrock optimism worthy of Ashra"

Which sounds ace! Also the new record by Mountains on Thrill Jockey looks great.

I'm buying my Moog MF-102 ring modulator this week which I can't wait for. Pedal madness here we come.

This weeks listening: