Stealing Sheep are back with third album Big Wows
Stealing Sheep reveal new album Big Wows, Getintothis’ Peter Guy on their new sound and listen to lead track Jokin’ Me
Stealing Sheep will release new album Big Wows on April 19 and are back with new lead track Jokin’ Me.
Big Wows is the band’s third album with Heavenly Recordings and follows a number of UK shows also revealed today.
“Both the song and the video speak a lot about today’s modern culture and how things seem throwaway,” the band said.
They added: “Whether that’s love, communication, revealing the disappointments and let downs but also the ephemeral of the delete, trash, emoji digital world. The way you can put up a front on social media, cultivate an imagined life, your best life.”
The band have teamed up with 8bit video artist Pastel Castle (Emily Garner) from Leeds, who created Stealing Sheep avatars and pixelated superheroes.
Big Wows, meanwhile, is heavier and harder than Stealing Sheep’s previous work. Bold neon pop songs with rave percussion, steelpans, dreamy segues and breathy experiments.
Stealing Sheep describe Big Wows as “a slow rush”; taking shape over a period of nearly three years spent working out exactly what they wanted it to be.
“We wanted sounds to represent TVs, computers and everyday glitches,” says Becky Hawley. “We started to have this feeling that life is like a game and how you can malfunction when you’re blasted with too much information.”
For this album many songs were started solely on the computer; sequencing, building sounds, drum machines and responding to that non-emotional binary world. “The big challenge,” continues Becky “is making machines sound organic, emotional, finding their flaws. That’s why Delia Derbyshire is so important to us. All the effects that she uses serve to humanise the machines.”
They have a broad range of influences – St Vincent, Michael Jackson, The Knife and Kraftwerk. “We try new things out and we get more confident about what we like.” says Becky. “There’s a really good thing Grayson Perry says about developing your creative intuition. You get to a level as an artist where you know on a gut level what you like and what you don’t like. It takes a long time to feel comfortable in that place, to know your palette, to know you like these drum sounds or whatever it is.”
Stealing Sheep: Big Wows
Big Wows track list:
1. Show Love
2. Back In Time
3. Jokin’ Me
4. Why Haven’t I?
5. Girl
6. Just Dreaming
7. Big Wows
8. Breathe
9. True Colours
10. Choose Like You
11. Heartbeats (hidden track)
The songs began at home or in their studio at Liverpool’s Invisible Wind Factory, laying down the main body of the tracks, the band then worked with various producers – including Marta Salogni (Bjork), Andy Smith (Years & Years), Ash Workman (Christine & The Queens) and Joe Wills (video artist for Little Dragon) – as they’ve tried out different mixes and ideas to convey their messages.
Live Dates:
14 Dec – Liverpool, UK– “Kazimer Winter Ball” (Wow Machine Performance)
25 Apr – Glasgow, UK – Broadcast
27Apr– Manchester, UK – Yes!
28 Apr– Bristol, UK –Thekla
30 Apr– London, UK – EartH
02 May –Birmingham, UK – Hare & Hounds
03 May– Cardiff, UK– Clwb Ifor Bach
Listen to Jokin’ Me below.
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