Newspeak is proud to announce the release of our first CD: sweet light crude
Listen here:
Recorded at Clinton Studios in March, and mixed through the summer by Lawson White, sweet light crude brings stories of hope, loss, inaction and rage. Through six compositions, commissioned from some of the most exciting young composers writing today, Newspeak shows its unique ability to reach the transcendental highs of a great rock band while maintaining the lyricism, dexterity, and nuanced intricacy of classical chamber music.
The disc begins with Oscar Bettison’s furious B&E (with aggravated assault)–a mixed-meter revolution–which is followed by Stefan Weisman’s understated, enigmatic and passive I Would Prefer Not To. Passivity turns to obsession in David T. Little’s dark and crooked love song to oil, sweet light crude, which is followed by a glimmer of hope in Missy Mazzoli’s In Spite of All This; the quiet before the storm. That storm comes in Pat Muchmore’s apocalyptic, Reznor-infused Brennschuß, which roars upon the listener with Pynchon-esque imagery, and guest vocals from Morean of the German black metal band Dark Fortress. When the storm clears, we’re left with a dust bowl, and the sounds of the howling wind. Thus begins Caleb Burhans’ Requiem for a General Motors in Janesville, WI, which brings the album to its cathartic conclusion.
Although each composition holds its own ground–and exists in its own universe of ideas, colors and sound–each tells its own important part of our story.
sweet light crude will be officially released on New Amsterdam Records on November 16, 2010. It will be distributed on Naxos of America, and available everywhere.