Hot on the heels of the split with their hero(-cum-remixer; more of that later) Alan Vega, Vermont psych-punk duo The Vacant Lots will be revealing their debut album Departure to the world next Monday, June 30, courtesy of Sonic Cathedral. Ever generous, the latter have given us a look at the new video for ‘6 AM’ (a suitably louder version than that which appeared on the label’s Psych For Sore Eyes EP last year), which you can watch above.
The tendency towards the stripped-back Suicide sonic aesthetic is good for starters, and this gets compounded with a glorious seething mass of feedback and underlying, frazzled energy that rears up before the track’s even passed 0.01 and doesn’t abate for a second. Talking of Suicide, after they had breakfast round Vega’s house earlier this year, the great man has made good on his promise to remix one of their tracks, with his take on ‘6 AM’ due later this year. As well as the patronage of Vega, the album’s also been mixed and mastered by another influence, Sonic Boom of Spacemen 3, while Sonic Cathedral label mate Dean Wareham plays guitar on ‘Tomorrow’. Pre-orders are here – we’d strongly recommend the black and white half ‘n’ half vinyl – and you can catch the band supporting The Brian Jonestown Massacre on their UK tour from Saturday, June 28 at Concorde 2 in Brighton (full details here).