Typically, releasing one of the best records of the year and then touring the world despite a pandemic would be enough to keep a band busy, but somehow London’s Dry Cleaning have also found the time to record the follow-up to last year’s New Long Leg and will release Stumpwork on October 21.
According to the press release:
Stumpwork was inspired by a plethora of events, concepts, and political debacles, be they represented in the icy mess of ambient elements reflecting a certain existential despair, or the surprising warmth in celebrating the lives of loved ones lost through the previous year. Surrealist lyrics are as ever at the forefront – but there is a sensitivity now to the themes of family, money, politics, self-deprecation, and sensuality. Furious alt-rock anthems combine across the record with jangle pop and ambient noise, demonstrating the wealth of influences the band feed off and their deep musicality. With the pressure of their debut album behind them, Dry Cleaning have crafted an ambitious and deeply rewarding new work that marks them out as one of the most intelligent and exciting acts to come out of the UK.
And specifically about the first, sub-two-minute taste of the new record, they say:
Clocking in at under 2 minutes, ‘Don’t Press Me’ is about the pleasure of gaming and the enjoyment of intense and short-lived guilt-free experiences. Vocalist Florence Shaw also says, “The words in the chorus came about because I was trying to write a song to sing to my own brain, “You are always fighting me / You are always stressing me out”.”
