Katalog

NO JOY

CAN MY DAUGHTER SEE ME FROM HEAVEN (JOYFUL NOISE)

NO JOY - CAN MY DAUGHTER SEE ME FROM HEAVEN 149244
Format:
1 MC
Release:
29.10.2021
Label:
JOYFUL NOISE
Kat.-Nr.:
149244
Barcode:
0753936908369
Montreal's No Joy_since 2009, a noisy four-piece shoegaze band, from 2015 onward, the sonic experiments of founding member and principal vocalist Jasamine White-Gluz _ has rejected convention, opting to find cohesion in vast, bold, indiscernible structures.

In the beginning, the group excavated melodious riffs from squalling guitars, now, White-Gluz approaches songwriting with abstract meticulousness, no longer tethered to her six-string instrument.

In 2018, it was the modular electronica of No Joy / Sonic Boom, an EP collaboration with Spaceman 3's Pete Kember.

In 2020, her first full-length as a soloist and No Joy's first album in five years, Motherhood, her guitar returned for a genre-agnostic, maximalist treatise on aging.

Fertility, family, death, birth, her voice heard loud in the mix, White-Gluz became a commanding force among the many-splendored sounds of trip-hop, trance, nu-metal, dance rock, and, of course, shoegaze, delivered through banjo, vibraphone, scrap metal, slap bass, even kitchen appliances.

Who knew chaos could have such lucidity? Now, White-Gluz's ever-expansive evolution has brought forth Can My Daughter See Me From Heaven, an EP reanimation of five songs from Motherhood, transformed by new orchestral instrumentalists: an opera singer, a cellist, a harpist, French horn musician.

These songs, recorded entirely remotely, are not a correction. They are a spring rebirth_an opportunity to grow those tracks, similar to the transformation they would've undergone live, on stage.

"Songs take on a new life when I'm on tour. These songs didn't get that chance. I still had more to say with them," White-Gluz explains.

"I probably never would've been like `let's get a bunch of classically trained players together,' if it wasn't for covid-19 [canceling tours.

This EP] was an opportunity to do something that wasn't obvious. It's a bedroom recording, but it doesn't sound like we recorded this in our bedrooms.

I wanted to do something that sounded bigger than Motherhood did, and Motherhood was recorded before covid." Where many musicians used last year's disaster to look inward, releasing solitary, insular albums, No Joy did the opposite: "It was more, `Let's try everything!' Give me something to look at!" And there is much to look at.

The songs of Can My Daughter See Me From Heaven are bigger _ but they're brighter, too, an ascension from the physical thrash of the terrestrial Motherhood.

Ugly, angelic arrangements are the reason, and No Joy's collaborators old and new are the cause: co-producer and guitarist Tara McLeod (Kittie) from Toronto returned, as did Jorge Elbrecht (Sky Ferreira, Japanese Breakfast, Wild Nothing) and Heba Kadry (Björk, Slowdive, Ryuichi Sakamoto) for mixing and mastering, respectively.

New additions include Toronto's Sarah Tawer, a virtuosic drummer who can cover any genre, Nailah Hunter, experimental harpist from Los Angeles, Montreal's Ouri, a performance artist and cellist, and Calgary's Brandi Sidoryk, a master of the French horn and a classically trained opera singer who performed backup to White-Gluz _ a No Joy first.
 
  • Tracklisting
  • 1.1. KIDDER - FROM HEAVEN
  • 1.2. FISH - FROM HEAVEN
  • 1.3. FOUR - FROM HEAVEN
  • 1.4. TEENAGER - FROM HEAVEN (DEFTONES COVER)
  • 1.5. DREAM RATS - FROM HEAVEN