'Black Anything', IS TROPICAL’s new album, recorded across five continents, released in five parts on 10” Vinyl, is out today through Axis Mundi Records.
Things don't always go right for a band. Getting pretty much every music video you've ever made pulled off of the internet isn't a good look. Contracting Hepatitis from the Moscow river isn't the best thing to tell your parents over a Christmas dinner; let's face it, nobody really wants to get arrested in Mexico, and having a supposedly good friend completely empty out your band account just before you start recording a new record, isn't the greatest luck - but what IS TROPICAL lack in luck, they make up in spirit. Emerging from a South London squat scene that sadly no longer exists, the newly formed IS TROPICAL decided to turn their backs on the dark times and look for inspiration elsewhere. For their third album 'Black Anything', they set themselves a rather large task, for a band so broke: record across five continents - North America, Africa, Europe, Asia and South America.
One strength IS TROPICAL have shown since the early days is that their music works equally well in a late-night basement party or a giant festival stage. This complete disregard of boundaries, geographical or musical has led them further and further afield over the years, and they have toured everywhere from Seattle to Ulan Baator. They've made a record which is equally well travelled, and one which sets up in its breadth but also its coherence a snapshot of a year of physical and musical exploration.
'Black Anything' is, in retrospect, a very dark record. Nocturnal, sleep-deprived, warped - but every track on the album has pieces of the place it was recorded imprinted on it. Never missing IS TROPICAL's pop sensibility, 'Black Anything' is the sound of a late night, somewhere, anywhere.
'Black Anything' will be released on five 10” transparent picture disc instalments, containing 2 tracks per vinyl and displaying the continent in which it was conceived. The five vinyls when displayed on top of each other create the globe, unifying the concept as a whole - each vinyl existing as an artwork and tribute to the continent it was recorded in.
VIEW THE PROJECT IN MORE DETAIL HERE.
IS TROPICAL will be in concert at Trix on May the 2nd!