Spin Magazine: “20 Best Songs of 2008: Violent Sensation Descends. In 1966, this alternately ominous and sparkly nugget would’ve been the No. 50 British single of the year, after the Creation’s ‘Making Time.’ It’s that good.”
Guardian UK: “If they can produce a whole album as good as Doomed, Trance Like Turn and Already Over, it’s (tour headliners) MGMT who will be following in Violens’ slipstream.â€
NME: “Aztec Camera and Tears For Fears are major sources of inspiration for this quartet, but during tracks such as “Full Collision” they switch from fey jingle-jangles into wild, MBV-esque noise freak-outs in the blink of an eye. Luckily, each side of the group is as entrancing as the other.”
Drowned in Sound: “Violens manage to traverse between eras that time forgot to the present with insatiable ease… at least three of the four songs on this EP could quite easily have been singles in their own right.”
Violens self-titled debut EP will be available in stores March 17 (available digitally today)! Having already received critical praise and radio play from stations around the US and UK (BBC1, 2, 6Music, KEXP and XFM), the digipack re-release has been expanded to include forthcoming single “Doomed”, preview the video HERE …. Lead track “Already Over” made its debut on the Zane Lowe show last fall. “Spectatpr & Pupil” and “Doomed” were performed during an acoustic session and interview on the BBC’s George Lamb show during their recent tour of the UK supporting MGMT. “Violent Sensation Descends” was named one of the Top 20 Songs of 2008 by Spin Magazine.
Following their debut performance with MGMT &Yeasayer in winter ’08, Violens have toured and performed in the US with Grizzly Bear, Handsome Furs, Chairlift, Telepathe, and Jay Reatard among others, in addition to selling out NYC’s Mercury Lounge as headliners. After closing out 2008 supporting Deerhunter at Stereogum’s “Gummy” Awards the band has holed-up the studio to record their first album, but Violens return to the stage this March with a pair of hometown shows and busy weekend in Austin for SXSW!
RSVP for free entry to their performance at Tribeca Grand Hotel on Saturday 3/14 – email – [email protected]
Tour Dates
March 11 – Brooklyn, NY Music Hall of Williamsburg (w/The Soundtrack of our Lives)
March 14- New York, NY Tribeca Grand Hotel (w/Peaches DJ set & special guests)
March 19- Austin, TX Schubas Roundup @ Yard Dog Folk Art Gallery (1510 S. Congress Ave.)
4pm set, performing w/Lissy Trullie, Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson, The Uglysuit, and others
March 21- Austin, TX MFL @ Red House, 4:45pm
http://www.musicforlisteners.com/mflatredhouse_day04.html
March 21- Austin, TX Viva Radio showcase @ Club Deville (900 Red River at 9th St)
10pm performing w/Ponytail, Iran, Titus Andronicus, and others
In April Violens will make their European debut, performing across France as part of Les Inrocks Indie Club tour with Camera Obscura, Cazals and Dinosaur Pile-Up. Having recently completed a tour of the UK as main support to MGMT, the band will return in May for a pair of London shows with British chart-toppers White Lies and Brooklyn favorites School of Seven Bells. More international dates will be announced in the coming weeks!
April 15– Rennes, France @ Ubu
April 16– Paris, France @ La Maroquinerie (w/ Camera Oscura)
April 17– Clermont Ferrand, France @ Cooperative de Mai
April 18– Lyon, France @ Ninkasi Club
May 7- London, UK Heaven w/ White Lies & School of Seven Bells
May 8- London, UK Heaven w/ White Lies & School of Seven Bells
Violens (“vy-lenz”) are a New York-via-Miami four-piece comprised of members Jorge Elbrecht (lead vocals/guitar), Iddo Arad (synths/vocals), Ben Brantley (bass) and Kris King (drums). Their music imagines a place where The Zombies & The Byrds meet Prefab Sprout, and
where Wire & Crass meet Angelo Badalamenti.
Violens songs conjure descriptions of nightmares, the passing of time, speculations on spiritual messages, and accounts of psychedelic hallucinations. Even their most frenetic guitar work and aggressive rhythms are draped in a gauze of reverberant, harmonized vocals and synths which create a sense of creepy, artificial comfort. A fitting characterization, lyrically and musically, for a group whose name sounds like a melding of the words “violence” and “violins.”