Artist: Feeding Fingers
Album title: Attend
Release date: 9 February, 2016
Item no: SFS 03 LP
Medium: Vinyl LP

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Sounds for Sure is proud to have released the fifth studio album of Feeding Fingers. 

This unique issue has been released in a limited edition of only 250 copies. We advise you to order your copy fast to get it safe. 

The album has been released as a limited deluxe vinyl edition, existing of three LP's containing 25 brand new songs from the band. The records are pressed on beautiful colorless transparent vinyl en packed in an attractive handnumbered gatefold sleeve with all lyrics and artwork from Steven Lapcevic.

Tracklist:
Record 1
Side A
Your Candied Laughter Crawls  5:21
Ashes Displayed in Zoos  4:36  
Perfumed Truth  5:08
Virus Tape  2:33   

Side B 
Barbed Wire Threads the Sun  5:22
A Sleeping Centipede Presence   4:03 
Attend  7:14        
Flusso  1:29      

Record 2
Side C
All in Full Bloom Smeared   4:23
Through Marrow Always  3:39   
Abrasive Remains Lubricate Me  4:14   
Polaroid Papercuts   4:31  
Quintet 1:35  

Side D 
At Play with Wasps  4:31
The Smiling Dumb and Serious 4:36 
Survive Bliss  3:51   
And Crayon Toxic Twins  5:17    

Record 3
Side E 
In Liquid Summer Schools  4:23
Did My Absence Follow Me  5:48 
The Last Bruise I Harvest Here  4:22 
Orphans Veiled in Feathers  4:23  

Side F 
The First Born Stands Sedated  6:50  
I Am Erasing Doors  5:56  
Where All of These Towns and Choices End  4:07   
On Glass  1:23


Album review by: Paul Tetteroo (Sounds for Sure Records)

“Attend” is the fifth studio album of Feeding Fingers, a project suited for the musical expression of animator/moviemaker, musician, writer and artist Justin Curfman. To a small group of fans, Feeding Fingers is known by now for their highly esteemed post-punk sound that stems from the early 1980’s, inspired by bands like Wire, Virgin Prunes, Cocteau Twins, And Also The Trees, The Cure and Joy Division. Still Feeding Fingers’ sound has been through a change. 

Curfman himself composes and orchestrates the music for his albums and he records the largest part as well. On Attend’s forerunner “The Occupant” he already tried for other musical directions. The music has become more layered and perhaps it has become more difficult to attach a label to the sound. To expand his possibilities, on that album Curfman also started to work with some guest musicians: a violinist and a choirboy. Besides that he started experimenting with various instruments such as the Theremin.

With “Attend” Justin Curfman not only continued this trend, he extended it even further. The album is the result of his decision to record a double album within 18 months. Eventually, Curfman was determined to record 25 songs which would end up as a double CD. However, since the album is released on vinyl, it resulted in a triple album.

This triplet can by no means be put in one box anymore as far as genre is concerned. It splashes diversity. Although a few songs still can be classified as post-punk, e.g. like ‘A Sleeping Centipede Presence’, ‘Polaroid Papercuts’ en ‘At Play with Wasps’, the total of the 25 songs are mainly connected by having been risen from Curfman’s creative mind.

We find experimenting with a  jazzy sound on ‘Barbed Wire Threads the Sun’, a song slightly reminiscent of Bohren & Der Club of Gore, a German band known for their dark ambient jazz. The song ‘Attend’ is even such an experimental mix that it could be regarded as avant-gardish.
So, no clear-cut straightforward musical pieces here, but music that requires some investigation, should the listener  not grab the meaning instantly. 

Curfman steers vastly away of the necessity of being put in a genre box. Obviously, this does not entail we have lost the trusted Feeding Fingers. Their music still evokes the sphere of dark realms and ominous feelings, e.g. in  ‘All in Full Bloom Smears’, a song that can easily be named goth rock. By the way, it is really a children’s piano that can be heard on this track.

There is also plenty of experimenting with alternative instruments. Is that a typical end of 70’s / early 80’s synthesizer in ‘Through Marrow Always’? Yes indeed, an original Roland Jupiter-4 forms the base in this song. And what precisely is that well known 70’s sci-fi sound that we hear in ‘Did My Absence Follow Me’? Well, that’s actually the Theremin, in a pretty weird combination with a hip-hop like beat.
The up-tempo ‘And Crayon Toxic Twins’ contains a large section of a freaky saxophone tones played by guest musician Ned Rothenberg. Talking of freaky: same can be said of the piano (the pianist is Japanese Shoko Nagai) in ‘Survive Bliss’. Together with the accordion and the applied effects this song is perhaps a bit hard to understand. This also goes for the short instrumental piano piece 'Flusso', played on Ivan Alexandrovich Wyschnegradsky's quarter-tone piano. 

The use of Asian instruments is also remarkable. The rather dark oriental sounding ‘Ashes Displayed in Zoo’ is completed with a bizarre solo on an Erhu (a two-stringed Chinese fiddle handled by Erhu-virtuoso Chuan Qin), an instrument that is never applied in Western music. The basis of ‘The Last Bruise I Harvest Here’ is formed by a Pipa, a Chinese lute played by Zhuxi Wang.

There is lots to be discovered with this new Feeding Fingers album. It constantly tickles one’s hearing sense by the diversity and the peculiar combination of instruments. At the same time styles are being rediscovered and combined. At the instant the listener presumes he grasps the album, he will be blown away by the powerful Sonic Youth-like noise guitars, in a song that also contains a poem written and read by Dana Culling (Curfman’s friend and producer), only to be surprised soon afterwards by the sensitivity and delicate beauty of ‘In Liquid Summer School’, a song that has been produced in a rather pure manner. 

Towards the end we encounter more of these gems. The dreamy ‘Orphans Veiled in Feathers’, the beautiful concluding song of the first side of the last elpee in the set, can be considered as the introduction to the impressive final side.  This starts off with the fragile ‘The Firstborn Stands Sedated’, a beautiful and delicate song, that is being lifted by the minimal sound of the piano, violin (Marica Filomena Coppola) and violoncello (Maja Backovic). Justin’s vocals even are as tender as ever before. 

At last  ‘Where All of These Towns and Choices End’ concludes the album in a dignified way. The drum computer and synths evoke a trancelike dreamy atmosphere on which we can easily float along. The beautiful and tranquil vocals complement the feel of this song.  The instrumental  ‘On Glass’, entirely played on real glass, accompanies us in these last moments of the album, letting us say goodbye to the journey we just made.

 

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Artist: Reptile71
Album title: In Dust: 2000 - 2003 
Release date: January 7, 2009 
Item no: SFS 02
Medium: CD

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In Dust: 2000-2003 is a compilation album of the tracks Dutch solo artist Reptile71 recorded between January 2000 and July 2003.
Reptile71 was influenced by early 80´s new wave, minimal synth, synthpop and post-punk artists such as Joy Division, New Order, The Cure, Depeche Mode, (early) OMD, Talk Talk, (early) Simple Minds and The Wake (UK), but also by more spiritual music like Dead Can Dance.
While dreaming away in a melancholic atmosphere the album tells stories of struggles in relationships and life itself, gives us a glimpse in Reptile's view of life and shares feelings of pain, despair and hope with the listener.

Tracks:
1. All Wrong
2. Home
3. New Times
4. Drag
5. Always a Way (featuring Feeding Fingers' Justin Curfman)
6. Upside Down
7. Hunger
8. In Dust (Move on)
9. Harder and Harder
10. Crystal
11. Saved


 

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Artist: Cradle
Album title: Official Bootleg
Release date: April 9, 2008
Item no: SFS / e.t.f. 01
Medium: CD

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De Rotterdamse band Cradle heeft in samenwerking met Sounds for Sure hun live cd Official Bootleg gereleased. Het gaat om een beperkte oplage van slechts 100 stuks, waarvan de helft tijdens de pre-sale actie al is verkocht.
In 1999 bracht Cradle hun gelijknamige album uit en daarna volgde een periode van veel optreden, onder meer in Engeland, Duitsland en Frankrijk. Ze stonden in die periode ook in het voorprogramma van 16 Horsepower. Vanaf 2004 is Cradle er mee op gehouden, maar de bandleden zijn nooit gestopt met muziek maken. Vorig jaar hebben ze besloten Cradle nieuw leven in te blazen. Ze speelden een spetterende try-out in Get Rhythm in Ridderkerk, waarvan opnames zijn gemaakt die terug te vinden zijn op deze cd. 

Tracks:
1. Away
2. Everything
3. Memory
4. Drowning
5. TV Screen
6. Dummy
7. I Wanna Be Your Dog
8. I Is They Is
9. Monument
10. Theme
11. Never End
12. Emma Vs Decades
13. (Bonustrack)