Arrangements on San Francisco-based duo’s first album
in eight years spotlight two voices “born to sing together.” See
“Drowning” at Stereo Embers.
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20 Minute
Loop (L-R): Kelly Atkins, Greg Giles. Photo credit: Teresa Miller.
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See the music
video for “Drowning” by 20 Minute Loop now via Stereo Embers!
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“Intertwining
voices and perhaps a bit too much drama.” – Kelly Atkins of 20 Minute Loop on “Drowning.”
“This song was inspired by bands like Low who were on
my radar at the time in the late ‘90s, especially the use of intersecting
monophonic lines rather than big chords,” says Greg Giles of 20 Minute Loop
about “Drowning,” a favorite from
the 20 Minute Loop catalog that
appears on the band’s new album in a stripped-down, re-worked version.
The song is just one of an album full that were
re-recorded with new arrangements for the first 20 Minute Loop album in eight years, Songs Praising The Mutant Race,
out now.
“Kelly (Atkins)
was there at the inception, co-writing the vocal melodies, and she wrote all
the lyrics,” says Giles.
Atkins is the co-founder of 20 Minute
Loop, with Giles, and the band
now includes avowed 20 Minute Loop
loyalist, Kevin Seal, who initially
sat in on the duo’s living room reunion shows in 2014, and then joined
full-time for the reinvention of these 20
Minute Loop tunes in the studio.
“‘Drowning’
was written during a very intimate songwriting period with Greg,” says Atkins. “Intertwining
voices and perhaps a bit too much drama. It did make for a beautiful song,
though."
About the music video for “Drowning,” Seal explains, “I wanted the visuals to answer the text of Kelly’s words. It’s morbid, but when I
was a little kid, one of the older kids in our neighborhood found his mom
deceased. It freaked us all out and the thought of it still flashes into my
mind occasionally.”
Seal continues, “In the decades since, I’ve had a persistent fear that I
would discover a dead body. That feeling of walking around the woods, trying to
quell burgeoning panic, has been in my nightmares for years.”
Regardless of its darkness, Seal admires the song.
“The melody and harmony are so delicate and lovely,” Seal explains. “Kelly and Greg wrote ‘Drowning’ long before I joined 20 Minute Loop, and I’d always found it
haunting and pretty. It’s slowcore,
really, like 23, maybe 24 beats per minute. It took me a while to get that
piano and Rhodes feeling normal. I had to drink some cough syrup first!”
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20 Minute Loop album + poster art
by Sara Lautman (The
New Yorker, The Believer, The Pitchfork Review).
Twenty years of 20
Minute Loop is celebrated with the release of Songs Praising The Mutant Race,
the San Francisco-based band’s first album in over eight years. The album
features stripped-down re-workings of favorites from the band’s catalog.
Formed by Greg
Giles (vocals, guitar) in 1997, and joined by Kelly Atkins (vocals, keyboards, flute) shortly thereafter, the
core duo of 20 Minute Loop
follows-up the release of five albums, with this, their sixth, and arguably
most passionate, recording yet. The
seemingly permanent shelving of 20
Minute Loop has now given way to a record that proves that bands may die,
but songs don’t. The collection breathes with both the wisdom of age, and
renewal.
Inspired by the reactions of longtime fans at a series
of intimate house concerts that 20
Minute Loop performed upon initially reforming in 2014, Songs
Praising The Mutant Race finds the group recording as a trio in very
similar circumstances: live in the room at Ninth
Street Opus studios in Berkeley with producer, Jim Greer.
In re-imagining and re-arranging this material, the
band wanted the songs to shine without being burdened by too much production.
Here the songs and singers are laid bare, and the result is a perfect depiction
of the vibe from one of the living room concerts that inspired the record, with
the band’s visceral lyrics and accompanying tempos taking on a woozy, syrupy
overtone that focuses on the vocal interplay between Giles and Atkins, who
sound more like they were born to sing together than ever before.
As a band that came about and went away in the age of
the Compact Disc, 20 Minute Loop is very
excited for Songs Praising The Mutant Race to be its first album issued on
vinyl, and they are doing it with style. Fans can purchase a beautiful vinyl
edition of the album with a jacket illustrated by Sara Lautman, whose work has previously appeared in The New Yorker, The Believer, The Pitchfork
Review, The Awl, and other
publications.
Songs Praising The Mutant Race by 20 Minute
Loop is out now. Members of 20
Minute Loop are available for interviews. Contact Josh
Bloom at Fanatic for
more information.
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20 Minute Loop
Songs
Praising The Mutant Race
(S/R) – Out Now
Track Listing:
02. English As A Second Language
03. Empire
05. Elephant
06. Hell In A Handbasket
07. Parking Lot
09. Aquarium
10. Carlos The Jackal
11. Windsor McKay
12. Never My Love
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20 Minute Loop Links
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Contact Josh Bloom at Fanatic Promotion
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