Glass Animals | ||
| Allmusic Biography : An intriguing mix of synth pop, indie, and hip-hop influences, Glass Animals are an Oxford, England-based band featuring singer/guitarist Dave Bayley, guitarist/keyboardist Drew MacFarlane, bassist/keyboardist Edmund Irwin-Singer and drummer Joe Seaward. Bayley and Seaward were childhood friends, but didnt start making music together until they finished school. Bayley had been writing and recording songs in his spare time, and ultimately drafted Seaward, MacFarlane and Irwin-Singer to play with him. While they were still at university they released their debut EP, Leaflings, in 2012. Though Bayley had planned to go to medical school after graduation, Glass Animals captured the attention of acclaimed producer Paul Epworth, who signed them to his label Wolf Tone in 2013 and released the Glass Animals EP, which included the single "Black Mambo." In 2014, the band released their debut album, Zaba, which blended electronics with indie guitar music and was co-produced by Bayley and Epworth. Glass Animals spent much of the next two years touring the world and gathering stories from the people they encountered (which Bayley secretly recorded on his phone). The band used these tales as lyrical inspiration for their second album, which the band recorded in late 2015. How to Be a Human Being, a concept album with each song telling the story of a different character, arrived in August 2016. | ||
 | Album: 1 of 5 Title: GOOEY Released: 2014-01-01 Tracks: 5 Duration: 20:15 Scroll: Up Down Top Bottom 25% 50% 75% Spotify AlbumCover | 1 Gooey (04:49) 2 Holiest (03:21) 3 Gooey Rework (03:05) 4 Gooey (Gilligan Moss remix) (05:39) 5 Gooey (Kingdom remix) (03:21) |
 | Album: 2 of 5 Title: ZABA Released: 2014-06-06 Tracks: 11 Duration: 45:31 Scroll: Up Down Top Bottom 25% 50% 75% Spotify Wikipedia Allmusic AlbumCover | 1 Flip (03:42) 2 Black Mambo (04:08) 3 Pools (04:48) 4 Gooey (04:49) 5 Walla Walla (03:37) 6 Intruxx (02:49) 7 Hazey (04:25) 8 Toes (04:14) 9 Wyrd (04:05) 10 Cocoa Hooves (04:31) 11 JDNT / [silence] / [Psylla] (04:23) |
| ZABA : Allmusic album Review : On their full-length debut, Glass Animals recall more than a few of their contemporaries: Foals, Alt-J, and especially Wild Beasts spring to mind as touchstones for the bands lush yet challenging mix of indie and electronic sounds ("Hazey," meanwhile, suggests a collaboration between Massive Attack and Antony Hegarty). However, Zaba also shows what David Bayley and company bring to this style. Bayley, who produced the album, lavishes these songs with sonic details that are almost hallucinatory: the echoes that grace opening track "Flip" suggest a slow-motion reverie before the song locks into a louder, and arguably more predictable, rock groove, while "Pools" lives up to its name with its aquatic sound. All of Zaba is coated in dripping reverb that gives it a slippery feel that matches the effortless way Glass Animals slide between electric and electronic instrumentation. "Intruxx"s looping beat sounds like a trip-hop rhythm translated into live percussion that sounds right at home next to "Wyrd"s bubbly electronics. The band is often at its most fascinating when it conveys the chilled-out sophistication of dance music via rock, as on the low-slung groove of "Toes" or the rippling former single "Black Mambo," which makes the most of the jazzy androgyny of Bayleys vocals. An equally strange and sexy debut, Zabas most audacious moments suggest Glass Animals will be an even more compelling act next time around. | ||
 | Album: 3 of 5 Title: Pools Released: 2014-07-11 Tracks: 5 Duration: 25:22 Scroll: Up Down Top Bottom 25% 50% 75% Spotify AlbumCover | 1 Pools (04:48) 2 Love Lockdown (02:41) 3 Pools (Jackson & His Computer Band Remix) (06:52) 4 Pools (Roosevelt Remix) (07:00) 5 Pools (Kwes. Rework) (04:01) |
 | Album: 4 of 5 Title: Remixes Released: 2015-02-24 Tracks: 12 Duration: 58:24 Scroll: Up Down Top Bottom 25% 50% 75% AlbumCover | 1 Gooey (Gilligan Moss remix) (05:39) 2 Hazey (Dave Glass Animals rework) (03:23) 3 Pools (Roosevelt remix) (06:59) 4 Black Mambo (Zodiac remix) (03:40) 5 Gooey Rework (03:05) 6 Hazey (Gabriel Garzón-Montano remix) (04:13) 7 Exxus (Patten remix) (05:32) 8 Pools (Kwes. rework) (04:01) 9 Hazey (Boody remix) (05:13) 10 Gooey (Kingdom remix) (03:21) 11 Hazey (Dark Sky remix) (06:26) 12 Pools (Jackson and His Computer Band remix) (06:52) |
 | Album: 5 of 5 Title: How to Be a Human Being Released: 2016-08-26 Tracks: 10 Duration: 42:31 Scroll: Up Down Top Bottom 25% 50% 75% Spotify Allmusic AlbumCover | 1 Life Itself (04:41) 2 Youth (03:50) 3 Season 2 Episode 3 (04:03) 4 Pork Soda (04:13) 5 Mama’s Gun (04:26) 6 Cane Shuga (03:16) 7 The Other Side of Paradise (05:20) 8 Take a Slice (03:49) 9 Poplar St. (04:22) 10 Agnes (04:31) |
| How to Be a Human Being : Allmusic album Review : After releasing their debut album ZABA, Glass Animals spent the better part of two years on tour, an experience that had a significant impact on their music. Not only did they translate ZABAs aloof ambient pop for ever-bigger audiences, the stories they heard from people they met on the road inspired How to Be a Human Being, a more ambitious, more engaged, and more engaging follow-up that makes a strong case for interacting with the world instead of hiding in a bedroom making beats. Written within weeks of finishing the tour, How to Be a Human Being sprung from an intensive creative process that involved imagining its characters, down to their favorite foods and hobbies, and recruiting photographer Neil Krug to bring its visuals to life. Despite this attention to detail, these character studies arent especially literal. Only a handful of songs, like the wannabe-populated "The Other Side of Paradise," offer much in the way of narrative or world-building. Instead, Glass Animals focus on a very human mix of emotions, particularly on the albums bookends: "Life Itself"s protagonist describes himself as "Northern Camdens own Flash Gordon," capturing the innocent swagger of starting out in a way that feels equally endearing and ridiculous, while "Agnes" records someones final moments with bittersweet majesty. Though How to Be a Human Being lyrics are more straightforward than ZABAs abstracts musings, Glass Animals vivid music does more to convey their characters. They use their animated arrangements more purposefully than they did before, even though the rippling "Cane Shuga" feels like the bridge between this album and their debut. The different guises allow the band new nuances: "Take a Slice" and "Poplar St" are two of their sexiest songs, but the former exudes seductive femininity, the latter a masculine strut. Elsewhere, the R&B and hip-hop influences that percolated through ZABA finally bubble to the surface. "Pork Soda" plays like a distant cousin of Blackstreets "No Diggity," while "Season 2, Episode 3," a love song to someone whiling her life away in front of the tube, is a mashup of R&B and chiptune that makes it one of the albums most adorably bittersweet moments. Indeed, despite its high-concept origins, the album doesnt take itself too seriously, and its vignettes are more cheerful than gritty: "Youth"s tale of motherly nostalgia and loss is one of the albums most joyous-sounding songs. How to Be a Human Beings sense of wonder and joie de vivre feels as instructive to Glass Animals as their listeners, and their willingness to try anything results in some truly great moments. | ||