The news of a new album from the otherworldly British electro outfit Pram–whose albums I have faithfully collected since 1995′s bewitching Helium, which is tragically still out of print–sort of snuck up on me, and I only found out two weeks ago that The Moving Frontier, their latest effort, was in fact being released today in the UK. (A US release is in the offing sometime soon.)
“Salt and Sand” from Frontier was just posted to the group’s MySpace page, and it’s a frosty, delicate song that provides a winter-beach-day backdrop to Rosie Cuckston’s sing-songy, childlike vocals; there’s a certain out-there aspect to Pram’s minimal, yet expansive music that never fails to be completely arresting, even at its most bare.
Pram [MySpace]
Pram – The Moving Frontier [Domino]
I dubbed Helium off of a friend in college and to this day it still gets play. What a gem.
A Pram fan with a Mr. Met icon?! Are you me in disguise?
@maura: I tried to delete the Mr Met icon this morning but nothing is working right over here for whatever reason. Fitting since they will stay with me forever. Anyway this tape was a 110 minute cassette and it has Helium on one side and Codeine’s Barely Real on the other. It’s one of my prized possessions.
Pram’s minimal, yet expansive music
Marvellous. :-)
Who’s releasing it stateside? Cuz Merge, their longtime US distributor sez it ain’t them.
I saw these guys supporting Pavement on the “Crooked Rain” tour (about 1994). The singer had her keyboard sitting on a Ironing board. i couldn’t decide if it was pretty cool or insufferably twee…
@Merkin: Domino now have a US arm- it may end up coming out through them. or possibly one of their long term licensing partners, such as Drag City. They’d fit right in there…
I have their early shit and always felt like I was one of the few people who knew about them. wrong!
I wrote to Domino a couple of weeks ago to inquire about a stateside release and nada. So, any word on who’s actually going to do the honors?