After working on solo projects for the last couple years, Echo & The Bunnymen braintrust Ian McCulloch and Will Sergeant will reconvene in the studio this summer to record the band’s 12th album, McCulloch tells The Quietus in a new interview, saying the record will be called The Garden of Meedin’ and will revisit the band’s early sound.
The album, due out at the end of 2013, will be band’s first since 2009’s The Fountain.
McCulloch tells The Quietus:
“I’m just trying to get a start before I get together with Will. It’s worked the same way for a long time — since the split, and with Pete (De Freitas, the Bunnymen’s late original drummer) and Les (Pattinson, the original bassist) not being around. All those days of rehearsal rooms used to get on my nerves — three hours of headache, earache, until I realized it was much better just to be in Yates Wine Lodge for three hours while they made a racket.”
He adds that his new songs revisit the Bunnymen’s early post-punk sound:
“It’s more like the early stuff with loads of spiky guitars and space. But as much as this is reminiscent of the past, it feels dead new to me. There’s loads of space on there and it just unwinds during the course. I like that about us, things like (1981 single) ‘Over The Wall’ — it sounds like a journey. A lot of that was down to Will.”
Although McCulloch and Sergeant have continued to perform as the Bunnymen, they’ve recorded separately for the past couple years. MuCulloch last year released a fan-funded studio album called Pro Patria Mori that will be reissued next month in a 2CD package titled Holy Ghosts that also features a live album. And Sergeant released an instrumental solo album and has recorded a new album with his former bandmate Les Pattinson as the instrumental group Poltergeist.
PREVIOUSLY ON SLICING UP EYEBALLS:
- Ian McCulloch unveils ‘Holy Ghosts’ 2CD set with studio album, live orchestral reworkings
- Echo & The Bunnymen spinoff Poltergeist announces debut album ‘Your Mind is a Box’
- Echo & The Bunnymen’s Ian McCulloch preps ‘Candleland,’ ‘Mysterio,’ ‘Slideling’ reissues
- Echo & The Bunnymen’s Will Sergeant records ‘Things Inside’ instrumental album
I welcome a return to their earlier sound. I did not like The Fountain at all. It sounded like the boys were desperate to fit it in.
Agreed. The Fountain was pretty mediocre and forgettable. It was definitely the worst record of their career. Let’s hope that the space, darkness and psychedelia come back on the new album.
Honestly, Reverberate could be considered better than their last album in my opinion. I too hope this one is better…
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Good news indeed. Fountain was good but not great. Honestly, I don’t get the argument between the “old” Bunnynen and the “new”. I like it all, including reverberation and electrification.
1 pound ears on Easter weekend:
http://www.weareyates.co.uk/