Halloween, Alaska - All Night The Calls Came In

Halloween, Alaska - Oddly (and terribly) named Twin Cities quartet  return with their fourth studio longplayer of lush, velveteen-textured art/pop and first since the remarkable Champagne Downtown from 2009... engaging melodic lines and classic references have put them more in the general vicinity of 80's U.K. trailblazers Prefab Sprout and The Blue Nile than most domestic comparisons...here the band looks for a less ponderously crafted affair, stripping back the sound a bit and cutting out much of the robo-beat programming...now even the synths and beats are crafted by hand // Release: All Night The Calls Came In (September 20 CD/ August 30 digital) // Sounds like: the band recorded the songs live, together and in a week, giving them a palpable immediacy...evocative new track "Empire Waist" again eschews much of the band's more pre-Champagne electronica past for a bright, direct and unadulterated pop melody...

Quote: “The sounds — whether gravelly bass riffs or lighter-than-air background washes — are so carefully picked and programmed that you dwell on their texture in the same way that you’d run your finger over the grain in a piece of wood … mesmerizing stuff.” — Sunday Times (UK) // What we like: the moody, laid-back pop/funk of lead track "Dance By Accident" manages to be both lithely toe-tapping and gently cerebral simultaneously, an 80's "new wave" synth gem with quaaludes and comfy headphones...

Halloween, Alaska - "Dance By Accident" (from All Night The Calls Came In)

Halloween, Alaska - "Empire Waist" (from All Night The Calls Came In)

(Sade Cover)