OPERATORS SHARE VIDEO FOR NEW ALBUM TRACK I FEEL EMOTION
RADIANT DAWN OUT MAY 17
NORTH AMERICAN TOUR BEGINS MAY 28
WITH SHOWS ACROSS CANADA
Toronto, ON – May 3, 2019 – Operators, the synth-pop band have shared another new track, I Feel Emotion, off their forthcoming sophomore LP Radiant Dawn, out May 17, on Last Gang. The band, featuring Dan Boeckner (Wolf Parade, Handsome Furs, Divine Fits), Devojka, and Sam Brown (Divine Fits, New Bomb Turks), teamed up with directors, Caleb Bardgett and Johnny Dunn, for the song’s video.
“We‘d been working with Operators on creating a dystopian travel ad for Radiant Dawn, a sort of near-future vision of the near-former country of Yugoslavia (or an alternate universe version of it), and it quickly evolved into a larger series of these sinister-ish videos. I Feel Emotion is kinda the last episode in that saga (for now at least). Its set in a world newly-devoid of human life, and these TV sets are the last artifacts of human emotion, playing loops from lost transmissions from some other space-time.”
Listen to I Feel Emotion here and pre-order Radiant Dawn here.
“I Feel Emotion is a song for anyone who feels like they don’t know how to be alive in the world today. The video we made for I Feel Emotion is compound nostalgia. It was inspired by a video installation I saw at an exhibition at MOMA called Toward A Concrete Utopia, Architecture in Yugoslavia 1948-1980. The installation was a stack of tv screens playing short loops taken from what looked to be old commercials and footage of people in various states of everydayness,” Devojka adds. “As a first generation ex-Yugoslavian, I was surprised to find myself fascinated and moved; the intimacy of a woman ecstatically twirling with her purse flung on her shoulder in her smart and modern skirt completely arrested me. I come from a long line of pain, and I’ve been estranged from my family for some years now. Making the video was a way to connect to this heritage; something equally familiar and foreign to me. I combed through hours of footage from old Yugoslavian films looking for those intimate moments - the moments that happen between the BIG EVENTS in our lives.”
The album's nine tracks meld raw analog hardware with Boeckner's distinct voice to create an immersive cinematic sound. Operators previously released album track Faithless”, a song Consequence of Sound called “darkly coruscating electropop cut with just a hint of ’80s psychedelia adding to the warmth, as solid a return single as anyone could hope for.” Interspersed between the tracks are instrumental intertitles that amplify the album’s 1970s sci-fi dystopian feel. For fans of Boeckner’s catalogue, Radiant Dawn feels like the next logical step in the artist’s two-decade career, while maintaining a completely fresh energy.
Radiant Dawn was written and recorded throughout 2018 and early 2019 in Montreal and Vancouver Island. Arcade Fire’s Tim Kingsbury played bass on the album’s closing track, “Low Life.” The album was co-produced by Wolf Parade's Arlen Thompson along with up and coming Montreal engineer Napster Vertigo. It was mastered by the Lodge’s Emily Lazar (on the heels of her 2019 Grammy® award win).
LA Weekly, after hearing a preview of the record, made it the album of the week nearly a month before its release, saying, “The first hints of greatness came with the release of EP1 in 2014, followed by the debut full-length, Blue Wave, two years later. But it's the majesty of the 14 songs that fill Radiant Dawn that show just how far this group has come.”
Operators is a Montreal based project. The band released an EP (EP1) in 2014, and released their first LP (Blue Wave) in 2016, via Last Gang Records. While recording their sophomore LP, the members of the band kept busy with a series of other endeavors, including the promotional cycle around Wolf Parade’s Cry Cry Cry LP, a series of performances in which Operators played material from the Handsome Furs catalog (which all sold out in less than six hours), and Boeckner’s original song for the critically acclaimed 2018 film, Mandy.
Operators also recently announced an extensive North American summer tour, kicking off May 28 at Chicago’s Lincoln Hall, with stops across western Canada through June, and hitting venues across the US through July. You’ll be able to catch their electric live set when they headline LA’s Teragram Ballroom, NYC’s Bowery Ballroom, and more. See all tour dates below and visit www.operatorsmusic.com for tickets links and more information.
WATCH ALBUM TRAILER HERE
Pre-order Radiant Dawn: smarturl.it/radiantdawn
OPERATORS ON TOUR:
May 28 - Chicago, IL- Lincoln Hall
May 29 - Minneapolis, MN - Turf Club
May 31 - Winnipeg, MB - Good Will
June 1 - Saskatoon, SK - Capitol
June 3 - Edmonton, AB - Starlite
June 4 - Calgary, AB - Commonwealth
June 6 - Victoria, BC - Upstairs
June 7 - Vancouver, BC - Fortune Sound Club
June 8 - Vancouver, BC - Fortune Sound Club
June 9 - Seattle, WA - Neumos
June 10 - Portland, OR - Doug Fir
June 12 - San Francisco, CA - Independent
June 13 - Los Angeles CA – Teragram Ballroom
June 14 - San Diego, CA - Casbah
June 15 - Phoenix, AZ - Valley Bar
June 17 - Salt Lake City, UT - Kilby Court
June 18 - Denver, CO - Lost Lake
June 19 - Albuquerque, NM - Launchpad
June 20 - Dallas, TX - Three Links
June 21 - Austin, TX - 3TEN ACL Live
June 22 - Houston, TX - White Oak Music Hall
June 24 - Atlanta, GA - Earl
June 25 - Nashville, TN - High Watt
June 26 - Columbus, OH - Ace of Cups
July 10 - Allston, MA - Great Scott
July 11 - New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom
July 12 - Philadelphia, PA - Johnny Brenda's
July 13 - Washington, DC - U Street Music Hall
August 29 - Tromsø, NO - DRIV Festival
August 31 - Skopje, MK - Zradvo Mladi Festival
September 1 - Belgrade, RS - Elektropionir
September 3 - Budapest, HU - Durer Kert
September 4 - Zagreb, HR - Vintage Industrial Bar
September 5 - Vienna, AT - Fluc
September 6 - Prague, CZ - Meet Factory
September 7 - Berlin, DE - Torstrassenfestival
September 11 - Rijeka, HR - – Klub Zivot
September 12 - Ljubijana, SL - KINO ŠIŠKA
September 15 - Colmar, FR - Le Grillen
September 17 - Luxembourg, LX - De Gudde Wellen
September 18 - Rotterdam, NL - Rotown
September 19 - London, UK - Sebright Arms
September 20 - Bucharest, RO - Control Club
September 21 - Cluj Napoca, RO - Form Café
DOWNLOAD – Hi Res Press Photo | DOWNLOAD – Hi Res Album Artwork
