Photo Credit: Jo Bongard

With his debut album, Colossal Squid, set for release on 25th November via Blood and Biscuits, ADAM BETTS has shared a third new track & announced a release show at London’s Servant’s Jazz Quarters on November 29th.
 
“'Hero Shit' was me chasing a dumb euphoric feeling summed up by the title! Inspired by a mix of the Rustie's sense of energy but as played by a rock band,” Betts explains. “Vocal samples are chopped up attempting to sound like a crowd shouting over each other, but rhythmically tied to the drum kit, so there's a lot of chaos but it comes together in a way that makes a bit of musical sense.”
 
Hear ‘Hero Shit’ here: https://soundcloud.com/bloodandbiscuits/hero-shit/

As a member of Brian Eno’s favourite London experimentalists Three Trapped Tigers, Betts has spent years exploring the boundaries between electronic and live music, and celebrating the flaws thrown up when one tries to replicate the other. Taking the “Drums Vs Electronics / Man Vs Machine'” idea he’s been developing behind the kit for TTT, The Heritage Orchestra and more recently when headhunted by Squarepusher, but this album has a wider focus.

Having originally written, developed and recorded an earlier version of ‘Colossal Squid’ over a few months in various studios around London, the opportunity arose to record a live session. The resulting recordings captured such an enthralling energy & spontaneity that they instantly usurped the previous studio versions & became the final recordings for this release.
 
“It clicked that this was the way to represent the material in the best way possible - performed entirely live, as it happened. Any "mistakes", any looseness, felt like a step away from the feeling of material being written with the click of a mouse at a computer.” explains Betts. "It's really a punk album with tape delays instead of guitar chords.”
 
“So much electronic music has had concerns with performance - how much of the amazing programmed music can be recreated live? For me music has been so much about the connection between the performers onstage and the audience.” 
 
To record the album live like this, Betts took a unique approach, making a series of instruments on Ableton – a combination of effects, synths, and samples, all that could be triggered from the drum kit or SPD-SX - and “playing” them live, with the freedom to take the pieces in a variety of unplanned directions.
 
Working with previous Three Trapped Tigers collaborator John Calvert (Ghostpoet, NAO) on tracks ‘FUB’, ‘Substance Enthusiast’ and ‘Aneek’, the ethos was that no matter how exciting or odd the texture, it was important to turn each track into a piece of music with real form and shape. So, for all it’s technicality, experimentalism & idiosyncrasy, ‘Colossal Squid’ is an evocative, absorbing & rewarding journey: avant-garde in formation, yet undeniably catchy & invigorating.
 
'Colossal Squid' is released digitally, on CD and Limited Edition Yellow Vinyl w/ download code on November 25th.
 
Pre-orders:
CD/LP/T-Shirt Bundles: http://bloodandbiscuits.limitedrun.com/artists/adam-betts
Bandcamp: https://adambetts.bandcamp.com/album/colossal-squid
 
Adam Betts live dates:
Nov 29th Servant’s Jazz Quarters, London (Tickets)
 
‘Colossal Squid’ Tracklisting:
1. Drumbones (Youtube | Soundcloud)
2. FUB 
3. Substance Enthusiast 
4. Aneek (Youtube)
5. Hero Shit (Youtube | Soundcloud)
6. Winbop 
7. Tadala 
 
Links:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/adambettsdrums
Website: www.adambettsdrums.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AdambettsDrums
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adambettsdrums
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/AdamBettsMusic

For more information please contact kate@stereosanctity.co.uk / t. +44 7812 607 230.