About 15 years ago, Lightning Bolt‘s members set up on the floor in the living-room area of a fourth-floor residential loft in Brooklyn. Sweating in full-body knitwear and ski masks, they rolled out stacks of amplifiers and a massive drum kit, then proceeded to blast the 50- or 60-person audience through the sheet rock. Even at that early date, they’d fully harnessed their sound, with a harmonic buzzing noise so loud it’d obliterate most rational thought, and a rhythmic assault engineered to make you move in time to every jump and skip. Here was a confrontation of maximalist proportions that pulled off the trick of threading itself back around, linking everyone in proximity with the band itself.
NPR
Fantasy Empire has been in gestation for four years, with some songs having been recorded on lo-fi equipment before ultimately being scrapped. Since Earthly Delights was released, the band has collaborated with The Flaming Lips multiple times, and continued to tour relentlessly. 2013 saw the release of All My Relations by Black Pus, Chippendale’s solo outlet, which was followed by a split LP with Oozing Wound. Chippendale, an accomplished comic artist and illustrator, created the Fantasy Empire’s subtly ominous album art, and will release an upcoming book of his comics through respected imprint Drawn and Quarterly.
Thrill Jockey
Fantasy Empire is the first studio album from Lightning Bolt in five years – it was released by Thrill Jockey in March and comes along with a colorful video for “Metal East” track.
The band is also on tour (with Metz and Liturgy being supporting acts) that will take them through US, Canada and Iceland:
04-15 Buffalo, NY – Mohawk Place
04-16 Columbus, OH – Double Happiness
04-17 Cleveland, OH – Beachland Ballroom
04-18 Ferndale, MI – The Loving Touch
04-19 Chicago, IL – The Empty Bottle
04-20 Saint Paul, MN – Turf Club
04-21 St Louis, MO – The Luminary Center for the Arts
04-22 Lawrence, KS – Jackpot Music Hall
04-24 Denver, CO – GLOB
04-25 Salt Lake City, UT – Kilby Court
04-27 Boise, ID – The Shredder
04-28 Seattle, WA – Neumos
04-29 Portland, OR – Dantes
05-01 San Francisco, CA – The Chapel
05-02 Oakland, CA – Leo’s
05-03 Los Angeles, CA – The Echoplex
05-04 Santa Ana, CA – Constellation Room
05-05 San Diego, CA – Casbah
05-06 Phoenix, AZ – Crescent Ballroom
05-08 Austin, TX – Austin Psych Fest
05-09 New Orleans, LA – Siberia
05-10 Atlanta, GA – Mammal Gallery
05-11 Raleigh, NC – Kings
05-12 Washington, DC – Rock and Roll Hotel
05-13 Baltimore, MD – Floristree
05-14 Philadelphia, PA – First Unitarian Church
05-15 Brooklyn, NY – The Wick
05-16 New York, NY – Le Poisson Rouge
05-17 Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair
06-25 Calgary, Alberta – Sled Island Festival
07-04 Keflavik, Iceland – ATP Iceland
Reviews: Metacritic
