This Is the Kit - listen to the Rough Trade Session for new song “By My Demon Eye”

This Is the Kit released their new Rough Trade Session track “By My Demon Eye”, this track is taken from the critically acclaimed 4th album “Moonshine Freeze” and first for Rough Trade Records.

Kate Stables on the track: 

“This song started out as a project to make a piece of music based around the song that rabbit and tortoise sing in a Hugh Tracey story called “Rabbit and Tortoise”. I love the sound of his voice. Both when he's talking and when he's singing. And the sounds and rhythm and the meaning of the song he sings in this story just wrung so strongly in my ear and my head. The translation of the song’s chorus is “boil boil water boil let the liar be boiled”. The song that ended up getting written is maybe misleading as people find it to be quite a “lovely sort of happy gentle song” but when they find out what the chorus means they're often a bit shocked. But for me it is an upsetting song. It's not meant to be happy.  It's a heart wrenching situation between two people who have no solution for the mess they are in. but then again, I guess stories are often simply what we decide to hear”.

Watch the Rough Trade Session video for “By My Demon Eye” - CLICK HERE

This Is The Kit - the musical project which holds exceptional Paris-via-Bristol songwriter Kate Stables close to its heart - have earned the adoration of peers including Guy Garvey, The National and Sharon van Etten. Their new album and Rough Trade debut, "Moonshine Freeze", is undoubtedly their most compelling and accomplished to date. Produced by John Parish (PJ Harvey, M Ward, Perfume Genius), it began in the immediate wake of its predecessor, "Bashed Out", when days after coming off tour last November, Stables and her band (Rozi Plain, Jamie Whitby-Coles, Neil Smith and Jesse D Vernon) headed into Geoff Barrow’s Invada studios in Bristol. Aaron Dessner of The National also features on six of the album tracks. 

Though the album’s songs were already written before heading into the studio, Stables says she had no fierce vision for how they should sound, preferring to let them take shape with the input of her band and Parish. 

 

“I’m not yet someone who says ‘I want this album to sound like an 80’s French nightclub’,” she says. “All I can do is write the songs and then step back from them and see what themes or patterns there are, then bring those patterns out so it’s a coherent piece of work, sonically and in terms of feeling.”

 

Sonically, "Moonshine Freeze" is a beguiling mixture of great musical sophistication and something more guileless — children’s games, incantations and snatches of nursery rhymes. Stables’ voice too is a remarkable thing: in its angles there lies an exquisite strangeness reminiscent of Will Oldham, Magnolia Electric Co, Robert Wyatt, Karen Dalton.

 

Some press for This Is the Kit's "Moonshine Freeze"

"The West Country wanderers fourth album may be her best yet" - 8/10 Uncut

"A joy to behold" - 9/10 Drowned in Sound

"A five-star stone cold instant classic” - 5/5 Irish Times

"This is their finest work to date" - 4/5 Record Collector

"An absorbing puzzle to pore over" - 4/5 MOJO

 

The band have been on the road with The National over the last few weeks, and will be also supporting them on their upcoming US tour as well as playing their own EU shows including their biggest headline show to date at London’s Shepherds Bush Empire on 25 January. On 8th of November they will surely have a magic night in Prague as well!

 

Tourdates

11/08 - Prague, Czech Republic @ Cafe V Lese

11/09 - Vienna, Austria @ B72

11/11 - Lausanne, Switzerland @ Le Bourg

11/12 - Dudingen, Switzerland @ Bad Bonn

11/14 - Tourcoing, France @ Le Grand Mix

11/15 - Reims, France @ La Cartonnerie

11/16 - Lyon, France @ Groom

11/27 - Portland, OR @ Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall*

11/28 - Seattle, WA @ Paramount Theatre*        

11/29 - Seattle, WA @ Paramount Theatre*

12/01 - Vancouver, BC @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre*

12/02 - Vancouver, BC @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre*

12/05 - Philadelphia, PA @ Verizon Hall, Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts*

12/06 - Washington, DC @ Anthem*

12/07 - Montréal, QC @ Métropolis*

12/08 - Montréal, QC @ Métropolis*

12/09 - Toronto, ON @ Sony Centre for the Performing Arts*

12/10 - Hamilton, ON @ Hamilton Place Theatre*

12/12 - Chicago, IL @ Civic Opera House*

12/13 - Chicago, IL @ Civic Opera House*

01/13 – Stroud, UK @Brunel Goods Shed

01/14 – Liverpool, UK @ Leaf

01/16 – Cork, Ireland @ Cyprus Avenue

01/17 – Dublin, Ireland @ Whelans

01/18 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club

01/19 – Glasgow, UK @ Celtic Connections / ABC

01/20 – Edinburgh, UK @ Pleasance Theatre

01/21 – Lancaster, UK @ Get Loud in Libraries

01/23 – Newcastle, UK @ Sage 2

01/24 – Birmingham, UK @ Glee Club

01/25 – London, UK @ Shepherds Bush Empire

01/26 – Cambridge, UK @ Junction

* with the National