MANCHESTER ORCHESTRA RELEASE DOCUMENTARY I KNOW HOW TO SPEAK
COMPLEMENTED BY THE RELEASE OF THE A BLACK MILE DEMOS EP: A COLLECTION OF EARLY RECORDINGS OF THEIR ACCLAIMED ALBUM A BLACK MILE TO THE SURFACE (LOMA VISTA RECORDINGS)
SUMMER HEADLINE SHOWS UNDERWAY AND UPCOMING FESTIVAL DATES INCLUDING SUMMERFEST, LOLLAPALOOZA, OSHEAGA AND AUSTIN CITY LIMITS
Toronto, ON – June 29, 2018 – Manchester Orchestra today released a documentary, I Know How To Speak, that offers an exclusive look into the making of their acclaimed 2017 album, A Black Mile To The Surface (Loma Vista Recordings). Hailed as “an artistic triumph” (Exclaim!) and one of 2017's Best Rock Records (Uproxx), the album resulted in their first Top 15 Alternative and #1 AAA charting single, The Gold, as well as a career topping music festival run. The Ted Roach-directed documentary, which premiered during a Spotify Fans First Event earlier this week at Atlanta, GA’s storied Plaza Theatre, shares its name with the band’s recent single (listen HERE) that will be released as a limited edition 7” on August 3rd; pre-order it now here: Vinyl / Bundle. Fans can watch I Know How To Speak by taking a journey to the surface via a unique, immersive digital experience on Manchester Orchestra’s website that features additional behind the scenes footage, Genius album track annotations by singer/guitarist Andy Hull, and previously unreleased demos -- which were also released today as The Black Mile Demos EP (listen via YouTube HERE). Hull said in a statement:
“It’s been nearly one year since we released A Black Mile To The Surface. Since then, so many beautiful things have happened... A worldwide tour of playing these songs to our incredible fans, who have embraced this album in the most heartfelt way and truly moved us beyond words. We are currently in the middle of the craziest summer schedule we’ve had as a band, playing amazing festivals to wonderful crowds all over America, and having more fun than ever.
Today we are releasing two projects at once, something that we have never done before. First, a fly on the wall glimpse of the process of making this album -- the good and the bad, the ups and the downs. I Know How to Speak encompasses the wide range of emotions that the studio process brings, and we hope you enjoy seeing the work behind the scenes. We are also releasing a collection of these songs’ original demos in their earliest, rawest form. The Black Mile Demos are the seeds of how this all started. The initial, rough-around-the edges recordings, done with one microphone in some distant and often strange locations before they were continued to be worked on in Asheville, NC at Echo Mountain studio.”
Manchester Orchestra - Hull, Robert McDowell, Tim Very, and Andy Prince - will perform next at Milwaukee, WI’s Summerfest on July 8th, with stops at Lollapalooza, Osheaga Festival, Austin City Limits, and more on the horizon. A current itinerary is below, which includes additional headline shows.
Always seeking to push themselves creatively with each subsequent release, the band expanded their dynamic sound to peak form on the cinematic and epic A Black Mile To The Surface, which features production by Catherine Marks, John Congleton (St. Vincent, Explosions In The Sky, Angel Olsen), and their longtime studio partner Dan Hannon. The record showcases a band that rethought, deconstructed, and rebuilt their songwriting process to propel their music into a new emotional arena, drawing on Hull and co-writer/multi-instrumentalist McDowell's unique experience scoring the 2016 Sundance hit film Swiss Army Man (directed by The Daniels). The album earned acclaim from outlets including Entertainment Weekly, Alternative Press, Pitchfork, Vulture, Noisey, and MAGNET, among others, and Manchester Orchestra performed The Gold on both Jimmy Kimmel Live and CBS This Morning: Saturday Sessions.
Praise for A Black Mile To The Surface:
"[Manchester Orchestra's] most thrilling album to date" – Pitchfork
"Scoring a film - 2016's Swiss Army Man - inspired the alt-rockers to up the drama on their latest LP. The resulting collection is a mix of sweeping guitars, booming drums, and delightful vocal harmonies." – Entertainment Weekly
"It's the most lyrically intricate and sonically ambitious record that the band have made. It's also their best." – Noisey
"... an artistic triumph, the kind worth regarding as a creative masterwork among their collection." – Exclaim!, 9/10 stars
"Andy Hull & co. have written some of the strongest songs of their career." – Brooklyn Vegan
"...their best album, conjuring the grandiosity of albums like 2009's Mean Everything To Nothing and 2011's Simple Math, but with half the strain and twice as much as grace.” –Uproxx
"One of modern rock's most consistently great bands just raised the bar again." – Alternative Press, 4.5/5 stars
THE BLACK MILE DEMOS EP TRACKLIST:
- I Know How To Speak
- It’s Amazing
- The Gold
- No Ears
- Each Part
- Amplified In The Silence
UPCOMING TOUR DATES:
July 8 - Milwaukee, WI @ Summerfest
July 19 - Oshkosh, WI @ Waterfest
August 3 - Montreal, Canada @ Osheaga Festival
August 4 - Chicago, IL @ House Of Blues (Official Lollapalooza Aftershow)
August 5 - Chicago, IL @ Lollapalooza
August 7 - St. Louis, MO @ The Pageant
August 8 - Louisville, KY @ Mercury Ballroom
August 9 - Oxford, MS @ The Lyric Oxford
August 10 - Birmingham, AL @ Iron City Bham
August 11-12 - Redmond, WA @ 107.7 The End Summer Camp
October 5 - Austin, TX @ Austin City Limits
October6 - San Bernardino, CA @ Cal Jam
October 12 - Austin, TX @ Austin City Limits
DOWNLOAD – Hi Res Press Photo
