All posts by ryan

Future Past Now on iTunes, CDbaby & Bandcamp

Lovespirals’ new album, Future Past, was just released this week on the iTunes Music Store. Individual songs are available in non-DRM 256k AAC for $.99 each or you can buy the full album for $9.99. Though the official album release date was January 1st, the band offered digipac CDs and digital downloads over the 2009 holiday season exclusively through the Lovespirals Webstore. Now CDBaby and Bandcamp are offering Future Past in both CD and digital download formats, and more stores will be following soon!

Continue reading Future Past Now on iTunes, CDbaby & Bandcamp

Future Past 6-Panel Digipac CD Out

You can now buy Lovespirals’ brand new album, Future Past, exclusively from the Lovespirals webstore! This gorgeous 6-panel eco-friendly digipak includes all of the song lyrics plus beautiful photography by Susan Jennings and original artwork/design by ithinkitsnice, while the CD itself was replicated using real-time glass mastering and vintage CD manufacturing equipment for audiophile-class sound, care of Groove House Records. Ryan and Anji of Lovespirals will personally autograph your copy if you request it, and they will throw in an immediate digital download of the album for every order placed on their site. In keeping with this green release, the band will package orders in non-bleached mailers made of 90% recycled content (50% post-consumer).

Buy Future Past digipak for $12.98 direct from Lovespirals (includes immediate digital download)

Future Past will also be distributed via Projekt Records, CD Baby, Amazon, iTunes, eMusic, Rhapsody and all the usual online music sources, but the band wanted to make the album available to fans as soon as possible. As an independent band, it is difficult to schedule simultaneous release on all platforms, so those will be trickling in over the next few months. Please join the Lovespirals mailing list to keep up with the latest news, events, and more. 

Future Past CD Coming Soon 

Lovespirals’ long awaited 4th full-length album,, Future Past, will be available for sale Tuesday November 17 exclusively on lovespirals.com, with iTunes, eMusic, Amazon etc to follow soon. As always, Ryan and Anji will personally autograph your CD if desired. And as a special bonus, all who purchase Future Past from lovespirals.com will receive a free download of the album (in 256k mp3 format) to enjoy immediately.

Future Past is the band’s first-ever digipak release and they are thrilled with the results. Featuring elegant artwork designed by ithinkitsnice (who designed the latest album and singles for Blu Mar Ten), with stunning photography by long-time band photographer Susan Jennings, and printed on a high end multi-color offset press to luxurious, yet eco-friendly, 100% recycled Enviroboard™ by Groove House Records, this is one album you will truly appreciate owning in physical form.

Eco-Friendly 6-Panel Digipak of Future Past
 Eco-Friendly 6-Panel Digipak of Future Past by Lovespirals

Opus Zine Reviews Idylls

Jason Moore has posted a review of the original 1992 Projekt Records release of Idylls to his Opus Zine. The following is just an excerpt. Read the full review on the zine’s website.

Let’s get the obvious out of way: the Cocteau Twins are Idylls’ most obvious point of reference, particularly Treasure and Victorialand. Ryan Lum’s guitars create the same sort of jawdroppingly gorgeous soundscapes as those produced by Robin Guthrie, Suzanne Perry’s gorgeous voice echoes Elizabeth Fraser’s gossamery glossolalia, and beneath it all, there’s the cold, artificial thump of a drum machine (which serves only to highlight the music’s ethereal aspects).

Perry’s voice proves surprisingly versatile, moving from Fraser’s angelic cooing to an almost Middle-Eastern tone (“Scatter January”, “Forgo”) that gives the music its own special feeling of exotica to a state of complete bliss-out in which she’s more than content to drift along to wherever Lum’s guitarwork might lead (“Love’s Labour’s Lost”, “Noumena Of Spirit”).

As for Lum, well, he may be certainly indebted to Guthrie, but he’s certainly no sycophant. The acoustic-based “Love Labour’s Lost” could almost pass for a Lothlórien folk standard and both “Eudaimonia” and “Waiting For The Sunrise” are explorations in guitar ambience, especially the latter, which eschews any sort of percussion or any similar “earthly” element for a golden sound that’s truly fitting given its title.

Meanwhile, “Dead Language” and “Stir Among The Stars” are darker, harsher tracks that fall firmly under the “darkwave” umbrella championed by Projekt. “Dead Language” in particular is a chilly, goth-y delight; Lum’s guitars grow increasingly brittle and frantic, eventually exploding into icy shards that ricochet off the drum machine and threaten to impale Perry’s fragile banshee.

Lovespirals Spotted at Club Violaine

Joe of drunkrockers.com caught a few shots of Ryan and Anji of Lovespirals at the Club Violaine 5 Year Anniversary party with formers members of The Von Trapps Nick Marshall, Rodney Rodriguez, and Matt Gleason. Rodney and Matt both played with Melodyguild for a time, and Matt is featured on the Aitu release. You can see the full set of photos from the show in the DrunkRockers Violaine Archive.

Ryan and Nick at Violaine

Suzanne Perry on new Falling You album Faith

Love Spirals Downwards’ vocalist, Suzanne Perry, has contributed to two songs on the new Falling You album, Faith. You might be able to guess from the titles alone which tracks she penned, but as the featured artists are not listed, hers are “The End Before the Winds” and “And the Rain Comes in Waves.”

Check it out now on Magnatune.

Featuring incredible performances by Suzanne Perry (Love Spirals Downwards), Amanda Kramer (The Golden Palominos), Shikhee (Android Lust) and other Falling You favorites, ‘faith’ continues in the dark ambient / heavenly voices / ethereal style of ‘human’ and ‘touch’, while adding subtle industrial elements. Exploring what we humans do when life’s experiences shake the foundations of whatever beliefs we hold, ‘faith’ asks the question, ‘What do we do when everything crumbles around us?’

Magnatune

Now Faith by Falling You is also on Bandcamp.

Lovespirals Guest DJ Auralgasms

In case you didn’t hear the band’s 1 hour guest spot on Auralgasms Radio last night, don’t cry! While you did miss out on a fun chat session in the Auralgasms chatroom with Lovespirals, you can still hear a pristine archival copy of the show. Ryan and Anji chat between each song, giving not only track information, but a little insight into the music and musicians involved. Our set seemed to be a hit with the live listeners, so hopefully you’ll love it, too! BTW, this was the world premier of the SWS remix of “This Truth.”

  1. “Sundrenched” Lovespirals Long Way From Home (2007) 
  2. “Motherless Child (Karmacoda Remix)” Lovespirals Motherless Child EP (2007) 
  3. “Walk Away (Bitstream Dream Remix)” Lovespirals Walk Away EP (2004) 
  4. “This Truth (Soul Whirling Somewhere Remix) This Truth EP (2008)  — unreleased
  5. “Depression Glass” Love Spirals Downwards Ardor [Remastered Reissue] (2007) 
  6. “Unraveling” Liquid State Late Bloom (2008) 
  7. “Accomplice” Melodyguild Aitu EP (2008) 
  8. “An Angel, Ameliorate” Falling You Human (2006) 
  9. “Tomorrow [Hidden Track following “Dreaming a Thousand Dreams]” Chandeen Teenage Poetry (2008) 
  10. “Lazy Love Days” Lovespirals Long Way From Home (2007) 

Thanks to Mikey for setting up this fun show and to everyone who tuned in and came by to chat – especially Riki and CocteauBoy! Music provided by the Podsafe Music NetworkProjekt Records, and the bands themselves.

Ardor Remastered Reissue Now on iTunes

After a long delay, you can finally purchase the newly expanded Ardor [Remastered Reissue] on iTunes. This 2007 version of Love Spirals Downwards’ classic 1994 sophomore album includes 3 bonus tracks; a live recording of the classic “Write in Water,” an unreleased outtake from the album sessions called “Oisin and Niam,” and an alternate mix of “I Could Find It Only By Chance,” also from the original album sessions. Once again, band founder, Ryan Lum, completely remastered the album from the original DATs to bring out more sonic clarity than ever before, and the artwork has been recreated from the original photograph to striking results!