Those fantastic people at Tiny Lights Records are one year old!!! And to celebrate they’ve released one of those splendid cassette things that your grandad used to use. They’ve also released the brand new single by BLANK MAPS. This comes in the form of a CD. Now don’t panic all you young pups there is a download code as well so you can play all the tracks on your new fangled MP3s etc etc……

Lets start with the superb BLANK MAPS.
Now earlier this year we did describe Blank Maps as….”Paddy McAloon fronting Sigur Ros….” and I’m sticking with that. Here they give us four tracks none of which stands out as the lead song. Why? Because all four songs are superb. Like an old fashioned EP or even one side of an album the songs have a certain sound. Not samey, but you know they’re all from the same group of musicians. Partly Thom Piddocks lovely vocals, partly the chiming, atmospheric guitars but as a whole, wonderful. “We go way back”, “Just Call” and “Further Maths/Projections” bring back memories of early U2, New Order and the Cocteau Twins. Sometimes at the same time! More contemporary references would be The XX, Foals and Bloc Party. But they have a distinction all of their own. My favourite of the four, although I love them all, is “1987”. Check out the video link below to see I’m not making it all up!

How does a record label celebrate its birthday? A gig, a record, a big pink cake?? No. They get all the cool artists on their roster together to perform a Bruce Springsteen song and put it out on a cassette!!! Loads of great artists from O’Messy Life, The Lake Poets, Blank Maps, The Railway Club and all the other great acts on the label do a great version of the classic Thunder Road. Now these tapes are very limited and we have one to give away in our best competition yet. Not only are these tapes like gold dust but the one in the competition is dedicated to the lucky winner (see pictorial evidence below). We will also throw in a CD version of the new Blank Maps single. So, a question: Tiny Lights are not the only people who love The Boss. Badly Drawn Boy mentions Thunder Road in one of his songs. Which one? Dead easy. First reply by e-mail, or Facebook comment or twitter tweet or postcard or pigeon or strapped to the bumper of your chevrolet gets the prizes. Go for it…..

A big thanks to Paul at Tiny Lights and all the great bands that he looks after.

LINKS:

BLANK MAPS 1987 VIDEO: http://vimeo.com/47901931

TINY LIGHTS: http://tinylightsrecordings.com/

By peter on August 24, 2012