South Londoners Oh Wonder has announced their second studio album ‘Ultralife’ which they recorded in their own home studio.
The twelve track LP will be released on June 17th 2017 via Island Records in an era where pop careers require careful planning. Coming off the back off their very successful self-titled debut – which has reached half a billion streams – are now ready to share their new work in ‘Ultralife’.
Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West must be feeling they’re on top of the world right now after deciding to ditch their solo careers to become an infamous pop duo.
Written in New York and London and entirely composed, produced and mixed by the duo, Ultralife takes the hallmarks of the band’s experimental debut – its hypnotic dual vocals, its exposed, emotional lyrics, its bewitching, ethereal beauty – and adds the weight of experience, the confidence of success and the coherence that comes from forward planning.
Some of the album, including the strings, was recorded at The Pool in Bermondsey, but most of it was made in the pair’s home studio, where they had to work around TFL’s bus timetable.
Anthony West explains; “Our studio is on a busy main road, on the corner of two bus routes.”
“Whenever we’d start recording, another bus would go by. We couldn’t do vocals before 10pm.”
“But some buses do sneak in,” reveals Josephine. “The album opens with a bus, an ode to the fact that the entire album was compromised by London transport. There’s also a police siren from New York, where we had the same problem with traffic.
“We could have made our lives easier by going to a studio with soundproofing, but that isn’t us. Our lives are in these songs and it didn’t feel fair to leave the night buses out.”
LP Tracklisting:
Solo
Ultralife
Lifetimes
High On Humans
All About You
Heavy
Bigger Than Love
Heart Strings
Slip Away
Overgrown
My Friends
Waste
Pre-order Ultralife here: https://OW.lnk.to/UltralifeAlbumPR
