It’s been almost two years since we were given new music from Italian born now LA-based Porcelain Raft but it’s definitely been worth the wait with the artist today unveiling his new Half Awake EP. The release will be the first for Porcelain Raft aka Mauro Remiddi, on his new label Volcanic Field which he created “from the need to create a house for all my music and ideas. A sort of archive, a diary of my work in progress, for the sake to tell the story and tell it all.”
The first track from Half Awake was today premiered at Stereogum who describe the song “All In My Head” as “a falsetto-laden synthpop jam with a steady electronic pulse, topped off with soaring keyboard lines and a guitar solo that bends and shimmers.”
Half Awake will be released digitally and as a limited edition cassette tape which comes with a handmade linoleum print made by Remiddi himself. The prints are all made in Remiddi’s new studio in Highland Park, he tells us of the motivation of the prints saying “I started making my own print, sculpting the linoleum bloc because I liked the feeling of creating something from nothing and have it in front of me, straight away tangible. Music somehow is way more abstract, you compose, than record, than wait to be a physical thing, it takes months. With the print, to see it in front of you, it take few hours.” You can check out the tapes and artwork below.
Remiddi chose cassette as a format for this release, telling us, “I started recording when I was 14 years old, using a cassette recorder, playing piano, creating fake radio programs. Than at 18 my first proper recording device was a 4 track cassette, so for me cassettes are not a novelty or a format that I just discovered. It’s always been there, I love that saturated sound, I know that hiss by heart. That hiss makes me feel at home.”
Also announced today, Remiddi will embark on a summer US tour, all dates can be found below, do not miss his hypnotizing live show.
You can pre-order Half Awake now via iTunes or you can go to the Bandcamp and purchase the limited edition cassette and linoleum print here.
6.22.15 – DC9 – Washington, DC
6.23.15 – Boot & Saddle – Philadelphia, PA
6.25.15 – T.T. The Bears – Cambridge, MA
6.26.15 – Baby’s All Right – Brooklyn, NY
7.6.15 – Mississippi Studios – Portland, OR
7.7.15 – Barboza – Seattle, WA
7.9.15 – Bottom of the Hill – San Francisco, CA
7.11.15 – Soda Bar – San Diego, CA