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big black delta’s first EP just got posted in full on their site. you can grab it right now, for free. no strings attached. this is of course excellent news as it’s a particularly stunning mixture of lush vocals, pulsing beats and far out science-fiction soundscapes.

for our part, we are continuing to ensure that it’s dressed as smartly as possible for its various voyages through the internet, off the walls and into your ears. the above, massive, glossy, film poster is the latest in a line of offerings that you can decipher whilst listening to the music. in fact there are 24″ x 36″ editions of it available right now from their website. each one signed and a steal at just $20.

bigblackdelta.com

however if you just want the FREE EP. that’s cool. no hard feelings.

alessandro cortini, who the vast majority will have seen singing backing vocals and playing guitars / synths for nine inch nails or muse, is of course a formidable musician in his own right. if you haven’t heard the song problem me by his band modwheelmood then you’re one jam short of a damn good mix. SONOIO is the name of his new project, and it’s a 9 track album created entirely on buchla modular synths.

a fan of our record sleeve and poster work for mellowdrone, alessandro got in touch with us with regards to creating artwork to accompany his new music. we say ‘artwork’ as opposed to ‘design work’ because he was particularly interested in the looser, more painterly / emotional elements of our work over some kind of cleaner, tighter design effort. modwheelmood had been heavy on the minimal design / die-cutting and this time, the record being much more personal to him, alessandro wanted a more cathartic, hand-made quality.

we talked for a while and decided that we should try to create something that had a european quality to it – something that harked back to alessandro’s roots. combining this with a visual device that we felt was most honest to the lyrical content on the record, we came up with the two matisse-esque characters you see on the cover, who are trying to cover up the holes in their chests. the colour choices were then informed in part by the colour of the buchla synth itself. the pencil marks are that of my father thomas newbolt, who’s drawings we cut up and relocated elements of for the sake of adding more movement / life to the collage.

it was a long process – many versions were created and many strong ideas hit the cutting room floor. after much deliberation we all agree that the cover you see above though is the most profound and succinct description of the record’s musical content that we could come up with. as ever we hope you can form your own interpretations of the artwork’s relationship to the music and can let it grow with you as you get to know the songs.

the album, prints and t-shirts are now available in multiple formats on the SONOIO website, which was created by crosshatch.

we just finished work on a short film to accompany the release of the next track from big black delta. it was shot over a couple of days around independence day in los angeles. the idea was simply to capture everything we got up to in the short time we had, be that searching the night sky for flashing lights, watching dan akroyd talking about UFOs on youtube or jonathan bates making strange noises on his studio floor. we hope the end result, if nothing else, makes you feel like all these things are related. not forcibly, but maybe with a little serendipity.

jonathan bates, better known for his part in the fantastic band mellowdrone, recently got back in touch with us regarding a ‘new thing’ he was working on. as luck would have it, it was  some seriously rich and rewarding new music. the kind which fills the mind with images pretty fast. well, the next thing you know we’re watching the thundercats intro in total awe, debating wallpapering our apartment walls with TRON screenshots, and obsessing over UFOs. how one thing lead to another is neither here nor there, but it turns out we were all down with this new thing … and it was taking us places.

what then ensued was the constant, rapid exchange of music for artwork, much the way a choir does their psalms and responses. there’s no question in our minds now that big black delta was the only name you could use to sum up the music, what inspired it and everything we’d ultimately made together from that point forward. cut then to just a few days ago. cut right to the moment when we slung the cover you see above onto the proverbial coffee table. cut to us all looking at each other like we knew it was time. yep, ufologists were about to get some melody in their google.

it’s been two days now since the first song was released and people seem to be really digging it. there’s more great material on its way and we only hope, as ever, that people enjoy the unity we’ve strived for between sound and vision.

the new apex exposure website went live yesterday. it was a great pleasure working with josh scheiner and his team on this, fellow DUMBO residents as they are. as you’ll see from the site, they’re a digital marketing company with a wide range of great clients. drop them a line if you’re in the mood to market your wares, you’d be hard pressed to find a more personable bunch.

after selling out of the $2 smaller editions of mellowdrone’s angry bear poster, we got together with the band and produced a limited edition, high quality, glossy, king-size run. the final edition is 24 x 37 inches in size, which is about as big as your average full size film poster. it’s not often our artwork gets printed so large, but it’s always something we’re very thankful for.

if you are in need of some fury on your walls, don’t hesitate to grab yourself an edition while stocks last -

http://mellowdrone.com/poster/

recently we decided to revisit one of our first websites and revamp it a bit. it’s a site that continues to attract people’s attention and represented, back then, our first truly experimental work. we were given carte blanche to make the site any way we wanted, and in our miserable, dank, little east-london bedrooms, it meant a great deal to us to finally be able to prove our worth.

that said, we believe hugely in the ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ dogma and so have made the following respectful list of subtle changes to the site that we feel were only necessary to keep it breathing and satisfying its users.

1. actionscript 3 codebase
2. xml driven content
3. h264 video
4. additional ‘water colour’ interactive ‘sketch book’
5. full screen functionality
6. UI speed increase
7. new backdrop ‘studio photos’
8. higher quality exports of ‘day’ and ‘night’ short films

we hope, if you were a fan before, that you enjoy the upgrade. for those of you who’ve never seen the site before, we hope it finds a new and satisfied audience, and of course does a handsome job of introducing you to the artist’s work.

thomasnewbolt.com

we just created the 2010 open studio poster / invite for english painter, thomas newbolt. given there’s a style developing in the designs we’ve done for these that differs from our usual fare, we thought it worth posting last year’s and this year’s poster on the site.

as part of our on going collaboration with the truly fantastic mellowdrone, we’ve designed a poster to support the sleeve artwork we did for their latest album, angry bear. the poster is currently available in one size only (11×17 inches) and is exclusively available from the band’s label coming home records for a mere $2. yep, that’s two dollars. so if you’re a fan, do yourself a favour – get a pint instead of that double and grab one of these puppies while stocks last.

we were recently asked to write an article about the artwork we created for 65daysofstatic’s new album, we were exploding anyway. the article has been included as part of a ‘takeover’ over on drowned in sound this week.

it’s not often we get to talk openly and at length about some of the inspiring relationships we’ve built with some of our collaborators. furthermore to be given this chance and to have everything we said posted up, unedited, was something we’re very grateful for.

we hope you enjoy the article. you can read it here.