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Jan 09, 2019 The Twilight Sad By Christopher Roberts

Scotland’s The Twilight Sad are releasing a new album, IT WON/T BE LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME, on January 18, via Mogwai’s label, Rock Action. Now they have shared a video for “VTr,” a song they shared back in November (it was one of our Songs of the Week). Michael Sherrington directed the video from a concept by the band’s Brendan Smith. It was shot on 16mm film. Watch it below.

Smith had this to say about the video in a press release: “We were keen to do something that felt like one of our gigs and to stay away from elaborate narratives or abstract concepts. Playing live is the exciting part for us and having a video that represents that was always the intention for ‘VTr.’ We collaborated with Michael on the video for ‘I/m Not Here [missing face]’ and it’s important for us to have that consistency throughout.”

Sherrington had this to say: “When the band approached me wishing to create a performance-based promo for ‘Vtr’, I was enthralled (as were the band) with making sure that we didn’t just capture a documentation of them playing the track but create something that felt more thematically relevant to them. The aim being to make a piece that felt as visceral and arresting as the soundscape that the band crafts within this track all from the perspective of someone’s memory of one of their performances. I have always personally been interested in how we as humans perceive the world, the interplay between reality and our memory. How we experience events and the fragmentation of it when replayed through the prism of our consciousness.”

Previously the band shared two other songs from the album: “I/m Not Here [missing face],” a new song they shared back in July 2018 (it was one of our Songs of the Week), and album closer “Videograms,” which they shared in September 2018 when the album was announced (it was also one of our Songs of the Week). Listen to “VTr” below.

Frontman James Alexander Graham had this to say about “VTr” in a previous press release: “As I was walking my wife into the hospital as she was going into labor with our son, I looked down at the pavement and spray painted there was ‘VTR.’ I think the line ‘there’s no love too small’ is one of the most hopeful I’ve ever written - seeing that song title on the ground as I was entering the hospital to have the most life-affirming moment in my life blew my mind. That line came into my head one dark day as all I could see was bad news all around me and all I needed was a bit of good news or compassion to get me through the day no matter how small. Unfortunately, I didn’t see it so the lines ‘I won’t be surprised if it kills us all’ came soon after.”

Work on IT WON/T BE LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME began during the band’s recent tours with The Cure. Guitarist Andy MacFarlane worked on demos in his London home. Six months later the band got together in November 2017 in a remote rehearsal space on Loch Fyne and then recorded the album in January of this year at Devon’s Middle Farm Studios with live engineer Andy Bush. This the first album that sees long-time touring members Brendan Smith (The Blue Nile, The Unwinding Hours) and Johnny Docherty (Take a Worm For a Walk Week, RUNGS) officially join the band.

In a previous press release Graham had this to say about recording the album: “I’ve always seen Brendan and Johnny as part of the band and it’s time to say that aloud. From the actual coming together of the demos to recording the final versions of these songs has probably been one of my favorite experiences of being in the band. All four of us were throwing ideas in, whereas before Andy had mapped it all out. Once he got past the point of making the demos his point of view was ‘we need to make these even better. These need to take a step up from where they are.’ He opened the floor to everybody.

“The results speak for themselves: an exhilarating listen, by turns cinematic and claustrophobic in its scope, the band dug deep to produce IT WON/T BE LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME, and it’s perhaps their most raw and dynamic record to date.

“It’s a dark record but I think there are some uplifting moments to be had too. There are so many extremes here - there are moments that are harsh, then others that are quite melodic and others that are stripped right down. This album definitely comes with the extremes of every side of the band, I think. There’s a certain direct openness and candor now but at the same time I want to keep some mystery. We don’t like to throw things in people’s faces and spell it out for them.”

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