POISONOUS BIRDS release collaborative EP with Sunflower (Mark Holley, Black Foxxes)
Two of the United Kingdom's brightest musical minds have released a collaborative EP, titled Low Tide and the Dying Sun. Bringing together the talents of Sunflower (Mark Holley of Black Foxxes fame) and POISONOUS BIRDS (Tom Ridley, Finn Mclean, Jack Barrett), Low Tide and the Dying Sun is a stunning, yearning, emotive release, demonstrating the true power of cooperation.
Stream Low Tide and the Dying Sun here: http://links.poisonousbirds.com/lowtide.html
All songs were recorded in Tom Ridley's home studio in 2019.
As Sunflower comments: “I met Tom at the start of 2019 after a long run of feeling disenfranchised with the music industry. We shared similar interests but had a very different way of writing music and it was pretty obvious from the start that it felt like a really unique and interesting take on an otherwise very saturated market.
"We finished writing a bunch of songs over those coming months and didn’t really know where they belonged: whether it was going to become the next Black Foxxes project or whether we would start a new band. In the end it felt right to just release it as a collaborative project seeing as we both have new releases under our main projects (Black Foxxes & Poisonous Birds) coming out later in the year.
"Speaking personally, I’m fucking stoked with the music. It’s been a breath of fresh air to not have any other people getting in the way of the music and clouding the whole thing with politics. This couldn’t be any more organically created. I personally wrote these songs during a really brutal time of my life, and they feel as real to me now as they did then. As far as I’m concerned that’s what it’s all about. So fuck it, enjoy them. <3.”
In the words of Tom, POISONOUS BIRDS: “Mark came to me with these little demos: beautiful little songs, mostly with just guitar and voice - sometimes some other bits too. I sometimes deconstructed them entirely, rearranged, destroyed, deleted stuff, added stuff. Other times I was less heavy handed, and I just framed Mark’s voice with some nice instrumentation. It was a really freeing experience for me - Mark had already provided constraints. And those limitations brought out some of my most creative moments. I also broke loads of habits during these sessions - wore out all of my old tricks and had to find new ones. These songs, and the forthcoming Poisonous Birds material are much more original as a result.
"For a minute we started preparing a live show. That was before I mixed this record, and those sessions in our pokey little rehearsal space in Stokes Croft informed loads of the mixing decisions. Maybe we’ll revisit that one day.”
One of the more intriguing acts in the British rock scene currently, POISONOUS BIRDS are more than just a band. The trio have already been championed by DIY Magazine, Kerrang! Radio, Bristol In Stereo, and more, and have supported The Physics House Band and Sleep Token, among others.
The electronically-influenced group, in their own words, take more inspiration from the visual arts than music. Their live performances take the form of improvisational collages, more than scripted songs. Most songs contain well over 100 tracks, subtly sampling, re-sampling, modifying as they move forward.
Tom (vocals, songwriter, producer, electronics) has co-directed and scored a film for BBC Four, titled Elver, which'll be airing shortly; beyond this, he's designed sounds for Dyson and is co-writing, producing with ZAND.
POISONOUS BIRDS will be announcing more news shortly.
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