London-based singer/songwriter/musician Alexander Shields, aka, A Grave With No Name is announcing his new album ‘Wooden Mask’, set for release August 12th. The first single from the record ‘Wedding Dress’ is streaming online now.

 
'Wedding Dress’ is a thought provoking four-minute track that encapsulates A Grave With No Name’s dark, yet simultaneously delicate sound. With deeply felt, probing lyrics, the first single offers a look at what to expect from the forthcoming record. Speaking about the track, Shields said “'Wedding Dress' is a funereal dance through the barrens of mud and memory.”
 
Alexander Shields has been recording music under the moniker A Grave With No Name for a number of years now, but never has a collection of his songs more encapsulated the longing, desolate feeling of his namesake. Over 13 sparse arrangements, Shields carefully crafts voice, ambient noise, thoughtful acoustics and field recordings to create an atmosphere that is at times both distant and intensely intimate. Recorded over a winter at London’s Holy Mountain Studios, ‘Wooden Mask’ finds him opting for a more elemental, skeletal collection of songs than past efforts by design - and to extraordinary gains. Stripped and left bare in favor of complex arrangements, these recordings are given room to breathe and pulse and hang on their meaning.
 
But at its core, the album belongs to its name: ‘Wooden Mask’. Shields describes masks - both those physical and metaphorical - as a way to both disguise and become closer to our transcendental selves. “Whereas my previous albums have been preoccupied with loss, Wooden Mask is a meditation on renewal, using ritual and ceremony as a means to explore this theme.” Ultimately, he uses the idea of the mask as a vehicle for renewal, transformation, peace and transcendence throughout the album. ‘Wooden Mask’ is grounded in its relationship to the natural order surrounding its sound and space, but also brimming outward toward existential truths. It’s yet another staggering addition to Shields’ catalog as A Grave With No Name.
 
‘Wooden Mask’ is set for release August 12th via Forged Artifacts.

See A Grave With No Name live: 

18th August - Servant Jazz Quarters, LONDON
 
‘Wooden Mask’ artwork:

 
 
 
‘Wooden Mask’ tracklist:

1. Sword
2. Mask
3. Mist
4. Shrine
5. Wedding Dress
6. Pirouette
7. House
8. Pelt
9. Nest
10. Black Sage Pt. II
11. Storm
12. I Set Fire To My Boat
13. Tape

Links:
A Grave With No Name Facebook
A Grave With No Name Twitter
For more information please contact frankie@stereosanctity.co.uk / t. +44 7921 176502

Listen to ‘Wedding Dress’ here: