News

Sister Crayon To Release Debut Album

• 11th Jan 2011

The ultra hip LA based label, Manimal Vinyl, who brought you the likes of Warpaint, Rainbow Arabia, and Hecuba, now introduce you to their latest signing – Sister Crayon.

Something small and quiet at first, the Sacramento, CA based, Sister Crayon began with vocalist, Terra Lopez, playing classical guitar and pre-programmed beats on a loop pedal to attentive house party crowds. With the addition of members Dani Fernandez, Jeffrey LaTour, and Nicholas Suhr, Sister Crayon emerged seamlessly melding haunting balladry, rich analogue textures, and a rhythmic prowess informed by trip-hop and krautrock. Despite the music’s dark, melancholy nature, there’s a sweetness and charisma about Lopez that immediately strikes a chord with audiences.

Their forthcoming debut full-length, Bellow, is full of juxtapositions that inexplicably work well together: sorrowful yet triumphant, expanse but also intimate. The inspiration for Bellow derives from a few places, namely the writer Fernando Pessoa who had a large influence on the record. His curiosity and writings on death, homosexuality, longing, and general despair was the muse for the mood and tone, a tension that is present throughout.

Live, the four-piece use a combination of samplers, guitar, synths, and live percussion to lay down a steady foundation as Lopez builds and breaks down the songs, alternating between a hip-hop inflected cadence and a spectral croon. In the past year, Sister Crayon has created quite a stir with their inspiring performances playing alongside folks like Warpaint (who they put out a split 7-inch with), Baths, School of Seven Bells, Busdriver, among many others in their brief existence as a band.

A refreshing change from a lot of contemporary music, what you get with Sister Crayon is sincerity, thoughtfulness, beauty, wisdom, joy, and (perhaps, best of all) music that should be at once pondered and cherished. Stumbling onto Sister Crayon is like finding a book of apocalyptic poetry in the confessional booth of an old, burned out cathedral.

Manimal Vinyl release Sister Crayon's debut album, Bellow on 7th March.