7shades


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New video for ‘The Elevator’ now on that YouTube!

Yup, we dun gone and made an actual music video thingy, like what they did for Bohemian Rhapsody. That Ashley Jones of The Chaos Engineers forced us into compromising positions and then filmed it, the dirty bastard. MTV surely beckons. Please go and have a look and laugh with us, or at us, as is your wont…and feel free to share it, like a particularly undesirable kind of virus, if you get the urge.

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Ultra-limited edition t-shirts now available!

Ultra-limited edition t-shirts now available!

Yes, you read that right, in a rare moment of thinking about ‘merchandise’ (for our recent Pledge campaign), some bright spark (me) came up with these two designs for t-shirts, both based entirely around the number ‘7’, and then decided to do a ridiculously limited run of both, that are now available to buy from us, until they run out, or the world ends, whichever comes sooner. Both designs are silk-screen printed on lovely soft fairtrade organic cotton (‘Earth Positive climate neutral’), and the ‘unreadable logo’ design is printed in subtly reflective ink to freak out your friends and amaze your enemies. For the moment, both designs available in M / L / XL sizes, but get in quick or they won’t be. Just £20 to be the envy of your ‘crew’. Send us an e-telegram via this site to buy direct (preferable), or you can also grab them off of that Bandcamp here – https://7shades.bandcamp.com/merch

Oh…and should probably mention that our third album ‘The Monumental Midden’ is also out now, and available to purchase on CD or in a variety of digital formats, either direct from us on here (please), or if you must, via Bandcamp here – https://7shades.bandcamp.com/album/the-monumental-midden – or if you *REALLY* must, via a whole gamut of cock-sucking corporate concerns like Spotify, iTunes, Pandora (who?) etc etc etc.

‘Exploded head’ design

‘Unreadable logo’ design

These are posh t-shirts, innit?

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Pledge campaign countdown has begun…less than 2 weeks to go to D-Day!

Pledge campaign countdown has begun…less than 2 weeks to go to D-Day!

As a ‘fan’ of 7shades (which presumably you are if you’re bothering to read this blog), you’d have to have been living under an internet rock not to have noticed my emails or Facebook & Twitter posts about the Pledge Campaign that is currently running to try and fund our upcoming 3rd album ‘The Monumental Midden’, I guess, so this post is just intended as a friendly reminder that there are only *11 DAYS TO GO* until it will be too late to pledge for anything, and your opportunity to own one of the wonderful exclusive items that we have on offer will have passed you by…

Not to mention if you do pledge, you get access to all the lovely exclusive content that we have put on the Pledge Music website, including a video just uploaded entitled ‘Kidneys (granular)’…

So, if you are intending to pledge, please put me out of my misery, I don’t know if I can bear the tension!

Click here >>> https://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/themonumentalmidden

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New Pledge Music campaign is GO!

New Pledge Music campaign is GO!

OH. MY. GOD.

We’ve only gone and done it again.

Feast your eyes on the brand new Pledge Music campaign for our upcoming third album, ‘The Monumental Midden’, and marvel at the wonders contained within. As a special treat just for looking, you’ll be able to listen to brand new track ‘The Elevator’ which will feature on said album, and of course if you pledge, then not only will you be getting bostin’ (and some exclusive) merchandise at preferential prices, but also access to regular exclusive updates over the coming weeks…and the rosy glow that you are helping us get more of our sordid art out into the world. So go on, you know you want to.

https://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/themonumentalmidden

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Thanks to The Oroonies and Bristol, and onwards…

Thanks to The Oroonies and Bristol, and onwards…

Great time in Bristol with The Oroonies on Friday – and now, a short break from gigging while we concentrate on getting ‘The Monumental Midden’ shipshape and ready for release. Keep your eyes peeled for an imminent Pledge Music campaign, which should be launching this week with any luck…

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Great review of Kozfest gig :-)

Great review of Kozfest gig :-)
Thanks to ywannish for this rather wonderful review of our Kozfest gig, you can read the whole detailed piece here – http://www.alivereportsmag.com/kozfest-2017/
 
Or, if you’re click-lazy, here’s what they specifically had to say about us –
 
“Two especially delightful performances were offered by Tim Hawthorn and The Archetypes and 7shades…While listening to some the Cardiacs’ CDs in the car on your way to Kozfest, we wondered how 7shades, a band formed to pay tribute to Tim Smith, would be like? Still, their performance was beyond any expectations. Even if they pass as a tribute band, their music is original, mixing kraut, avant-pop, progressive punk, electronic and math rock with a psychedelic kick, in one theater-like performance, with humor and great stage presence. The brilliant acting and singing coming from Neil and Libbertine Spragg, full of jokes and pranks in contrast with the straight faces of the rest of the band, made everyone enjoy each and every moment of the show. They had various CDs for sale, one of them entirely a fundraiser for the benefit of Tim Smith and the other for themselves ‘because we need money too’. They also had the loveliest caravan on the whole festival field; we wondered for a while to whom it might belong until we saw them standing there once.”
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Upcoming – Bristol show with The Oroonies!

Upcoming – Bristol show with The Oroonies!

Very excited to announce that we will be supporting the legendary Oroonies in Bristol, our first show in that wonderful city. So get yo asses down to The Louisiana on Friday 8th September for an evening of much mind-bendingness and strangeity.

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Brief update

Brief update

Thanks to all who made it out to either of our gigs the last couple of weeks in Brighton & Birmingham, we had a right blast, and new songs seemed to go down well (despite some occasional hiccups on our part)…plenty more to come on that front soon (the new stuff, not the hiccups).

On that topic…we’re having a couple of months off gigging to polish up the new album, which is sounding pretty beastly it must be said, but will be back on stage at the wonderful Kozfest, end of July, with yet more fearsome new material under our belts.

Keep ’em peeled for updates here or on our Facebook page – please join in the fun there if you haven’t already – https://www.facebook.com/7shadesband/

Oh…and…while we mostly try and stay out of politics (unless you actually read our lyrics), please go out and use your vote on Thursday, and please use it wisely. We’ll trust you to know what “wisely” means…

Big gloves x

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New review of ‘Bursting’ courtesy of Bliss Aquamarine

Not often we get reviewed, so it’s always nice when we do, and especially when it’s one as good as this 🙂 Thanks to Kim Harten for the kind words! Go to link to read in context with other albums – http://www.blissaquamarine.net/albumreviews30b.html – also copied below:
>>>
7SHADES Bursting CD (Snafu Recordings)
 
7shades include amongst others Neil Spragg (Omnia Opera, Sir Real, Mocca), and were formed to pay tribute to the music of Tim Smith and Cardiacs. They are however a tribute band with a difference – you won’t find cover versions here but original music that aims (and succeeds!) to capture the spirit of Cardiacs’ innovative and seminal prog-punk-psych-pop. In Milky Train, bombastic choral and orchestral music collides with angular, jerky, choppy-changey prog-punk. Marking Time is a fine slice of eccentric pop with whirring, clanging rhythms. Nudey Prod Games combines playground rhymes with an altogether darker lyrical theme, set to gleefully absurdist, spacey, proggy art-rock. Spring’s Sordid Show has feverish and woozy experimental music giving way to huge, intense prog rock riffage. Hello Sailor begins with a torrent of impish, maniacal laughter, before launching into an exciting melange of punk and experimental psychedelia. Renard is excellent quirky yet sophisticated pop with folk, psych and prog touches. Perfect Storm is less frenetic than much else here, opting instead for a shimmering, ethereal psych arrangement. Prog has a reputation in some quarters as a pompous genre that takes itself far too seriously, but 7shades, like Cardiacs before them, show that prog can be fun, and can have just as much punk spirit as the most subversive of punk bands. Anyone who misses Cardiacs, or who favours adventurous, genre-hopping music in general, really ought to check out this album.
 
Find out more at www.7shades.me.uk
>>>
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A brace of gigs imminent – WITH LOADS OF NEW SONGS!

So after a quiet couple of months on the gig front, 7shades have a busy (well, busy for us) couple of weeks, with gigs in Brighton this weekend and Birmingham the next. If you live any where near either of those places (or have a minor sense of adventure) we’d be reet chuffed if you’d care to join us and try to sing along with the new songs that we’ve never played before (as we’ll most likely forget the words). Links below to FB event pages, would be lovely to see ya at either (or both, if you’re insane in the membrane) 🙂
 
https://www.facebook.com/events/209115606268339/
 
https://www.facebook.com/events/1774536229542722/