NEWLY signed to the ace Full Time Hobby, where they’ll find themselves grazing amongst the likes of Tunng, The Besnard Lakes and Dana Gavanski, Pale Blue Eyes are a young electro-modernist guitar trio from the South Devon riverside town of Totnes. Think a castle, farmers’ markets and one of the best record shops in the entire land, Drift; one of those shops that makes your bank manager weep with despair when he spies you entering.
And with a record shop that good, it should be no surprise that the town is generating bands such as Pale Blue Eyes, who make sophisticated future pop drawing on influences such as Neu!, Echo & The Bunnymen, The Cure; maybe a little of near-neighbours Metronomy, whose driving force, Joseph Mount, hails from just a few miles down the A385.
They had one single to their name prior to signing for Full Time Hobby, January’s self-released 7″, “Motionless”/ “Chelsea”; the former new wave propulsive, the latter Field Mice-mournful.
And now comes “TV Flicker”, emanating from a Joe Meek-like theremin motif into an ’81-in-’21 nugget of effortless alternative pop, big on the eeriness and the motorik.
Singer-guitarist Matt Board details the track’s haunting genesis: “At the time of my Dad’s death I’d sometimes fall asleep in front of a flickering TV. It was calming to drift off to sound or background dialogue and it helped me sleep.
“The music and lyrics in ‘TV Flicker’ also maybe conjure ambiguous images of 1970s’ Cold War décor: post-apocalyptic hideouts, a hatch leading into a lost nuclear bunker.”
Drummer Lucy Board says of the song: “It does feel full of ghostly traces; feelings and recollections from the time of a sudden family bereavement, a snapshot into an anxiety-fuelled head-space and not being able to switch off your thoughts, blankly staring at the TV.”
The single comes accompanied by a simple but effective lyric video, made by bassist Aubrey Simpson and Dylan Friese-Greene.
The trio have been spending their time wisely in constructing a recording studio of their very own from which to bring forth musical missives, nestled in the southern foothills of Dartmoor; it’s where they recorded their forthcoming debut album, which is due for release sometime in the new year.
Pale Blues Eyes are taking to the road, too, with a solitary date in what remains of this year and then a more comprehensive series of show with Silverbacks come spring. Those dates are as follows:
Saturday, December 18th, Bristol, Rough Trade, with WH Lung. tickets here;
Wednesday, March 2nd, 2022, Dublin, Whelan’s;
Sunday, March 6th, Manchester, Yes, Basement;
Monday, March 7th, Liverpool, Jimmy’s;
Tuesday, March 8th, Bristol, The Louisiana;
Wednesday, March 9th, Brighton, Prince Albert;
Thursday, March 10th, London, Bethnal Green, The Sebright Arms;
Friday, March 11th, Portsmouth, The Loft, and
Saturday, March 12th, Leeds, Headrow House.
Tickets for this run of dates with Silverbacks are available here.
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