‘Burn Into Light’ by Sleepytime Gorilla Museum | New Album, ‘Sleepytime Gorilla Museum of the Last Human Being’
Exclusive video premiere of ‘Burn Into Light’ by Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, taken from the upcoming album, ‘Sleepytime Gorilla Museum of the Last Human Being,’ out February 23rd via AVANT NIGHT / Joyful Noise.
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum (SGM), the most gloriously uncategorizable American band in existence, has rebanded after 13 years to complete a fourth studio album titled ‘Sleepytime Gorilla Museum of the Last Human Being’. It will be the very first release of AVANT NIGHT – a new imprint headed by Nick Ohler and facilitated by Joyful Noise Recordings. Following last month’s release of their forthcoming record’s first single (‘Salamander in Two Worlds’), Sleepytime Gorilla Museum returns today with a second cut entitled ‘Burn Into Light’. Described by one listener as a “visceral album highlight,” the track reminisces of an apocalyptic doom not yet suffered but seemingly inevitable. Either by fiery cataclysm or painfully slow suffocation, we wonder what evidence we will leave behind, if any? The track additionally comes alongside an accompanying visual, described by director Tas Limur (Conjuring Visions, Inc.) as “a mesmerizing visual tapestry.”
The music video weaves its spell among masterful studio scenes filmed in Los Angeles, through mystical woods of Oakland, and into enchanting forests of Cape Cod,” Limur continues. “A cinematic journey unfolds, capturing the essence of the band’s upcoming album, ‘Of the Last Human Being’. The viewer is beckoned into a world where sound and imagery converge, where mystery and emotion dance in tandem, and where the esoteric allure of the band is vividly brought to life. This obscure gem invites the audience to immerse themselves in the haunting glow of ‘Burn into Light.'”
Back in 2011, amid cries of protest and disbelief, the Museum closed its doors and disbanded indefinitely. Persistent rumors about a posthumous album flew across Sleepytime’s global community for years before eventually settling into the tall grass of time like a swarm of cicadas at summer’s end. “Sperm swam. Eggs applauded. Babies hatched. Other bands were born,” recalls curator Matthias Bossi. Labels and alliances perished. Ailments festered. Several beloved friends and family members passed away. “The SGM fields lay fallow for a decade and more.” Only now, a baker’s dozen years later, is the buzz rising once again.
The Museum — comprised of multi-instrumentalists and rotating vocalists Nils Frykdahl, Carla Kihlstedt, Michael “Iago” Mellender, Matthias Bossi, and Dan Rathbun — plays an arsenal of instruments ranging from the somewhat standard (drums, electric guitars, bass, electric violin) to the rare (bass harmonica, nyckelharpa, marxophone) to the homemade (Slide-Piano Log, Electric Pancreas, Pedal-Action Wiggler). The group has consistently evaded easy categorization, garnering accolades from across the aisles of contemporary classical music, prog rock, industrial music, metal, avant-garde improv, and more. Their music, in turns bashing and bucolic, enveloping and unsettling, tends towards long-form epics interspersed with mysterious field recordings.
“As this slow-rolling planetwide Anthropocene Extinction event deepens, Sleepytime’s work has only grown more resonant, more prescient,” offers Mer Yayanos, current symposiarch and secretary of the Museum’s long standing social math club, the John Kane Society. “What better time for them to Bring Back the Apocalypse than right now, with a new full-length record that integrates the past and the future?”
“A kind of buzzing warmth stirs in my belly,” says SGM co-founder Carla Kihlstedt. “Partly, it’s the re-kindling of old friendships, but it’s also the connectivity of reigniting a community, an ethos, and a commitment to creative and independent expression, and to vibrant collectivism. I believe in every messy molecule of SGM, from its many heads to its stinky toes, from its music to its wandering soul. How lucky are we to return to the hive after all these years?!”
Rock against rock and rejoice! The Museum’s long-languishing ‘Last Human Being’ will soon see the light of day!
Through the AVANT NIGHT website, there are pre-order options for CD and three Vinyl variations: “SLEEPYTIME SPLATTER” [567 pressing of a multicolor splatter design (Gray/Red/Black)], “ROSE COLORED ROCK” (1500 pressing in two variations of Blood Red), and “GRAND REOPENING GOLD” (3000 pressing in simmering Gold).
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Joyful Noise Recordings Official Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Bandcamp / YouTube
