Seattle three-piece Helms Alee has released a new album Keep This Be The Way, available now via Sargent House.
Across the span of their first five studio albums, the trio zeroed in on different aspects of their sound – a blend of lilting siren songs, crushing Northwest thunder and sludge, angular econo-rock, and heady guitar pop while retaining their no-frills, meat-and-potatoes approach in the studio. But with this, Helms Alee have expanded their palette by delving into the production possibilities afforded by recording the album themselves, creating their most dynamic and technicolored work to date.
REVISIT THE VIDEO FOR ALBUM OPENER “SEE SIGHTS SMELL SMELLS” VIA YOUTUBE BELOW
When the pandemic hit, guitarist/vocalist Ben Verellen, bassist/vocalist Dana James, and drummer/vocalist Hozoji Matheson-Margullis found refuge in their music and bunkered down in a makeshift studio in Verellen’s amplifier shop. Through the remainder of 2020 and into early 2021, the band wrote an album as a distraction from the surrounding turbulence, recording songs with the assistance of Ron Harrell as they were writing them, composing the material with the added benefit of hearing them come together from the engineer’s chair. Keep This Be the Way still very much sounds like a Helms Alee record, but it’s their first album that diverts from the faithful recreation of their live sound and delves into a vibrant tapestry of surreal sounds and invented spaces.
This new approach is immediately evident on the aforementioned album opener “See Sights Smell Smells,” where reverse cymbal crashes, fragmented piano, layered drums, woozy drones, saxophone freak-outs, and trippy vocal treatments transport the listener to an altered state of exhilarated anticipation. The song basks in studio manipulations before depositing the listeners on the shores of the title track. “Keep This Be the Way” adheres closer to standard Helms Alee operating procedures with sparkling guitar arpeggios, syncopated drum patterns, and beguiling vocal melodies in the verses juxtaposed against blown-out bottom-heavy riffs and roaring harmonies in the choruses, until the song descends into a smoky mélange of groaning bass and air-raid siren whines in the final measures. Much like the self-recorded swan song of Unwound Leaves Turn Inside You, Keep This Be the Way showcases an ability to walk the line between studio experimentation and faithful representations of the organic core of the material.
KEEP THIS BE THE WAY TRACKLISTING
1. See Sights Smell Smells – official video
2. Keep This Be The Way
3. How Party Do You Hard
4. Tripping Up The Stairs – official video
5. Big Louise
6. Do Not Expose to the Burning Sun
7. The Middle Half
8. Mouth Thinker
9. Three Cheeks To The Wind
10. Guts for Brains
REVISIT THE VIDEO FOR ‘TRIPPING UP THE STAIRS’ ON YOUTUBE BELOW
Helms Alee continue their tour with label mates Russian Circles in support of this album. Tickets and more info available here.
EU 2022 with Russian Circles:
APRIL 29 PORTO, PT – HARD CLUB
APRIL 30 LISBON, PT – LISBOA AO VIVO
MAY 01 SEVILLA, ES – SALA CUSTOM
MAY 03 BARCELONA, ES – LA2
MAY 05 MILAN, IT – CIRCOLO MAGNOLIA
MAY 06 ROME, IT – ORION CLUB
MAY 07 BOLOGNA, IT – TPO
MAY 09 RIJEKA, HR – POGON KULTURE
MAY 10 BUDAPEST, HUN – AKVARIUM KLUB
MAY 11 VIENNA, AT – FLEX
MAY 12 LEIPZIG, DE – CONNE ISLAND
MAY 14 LOHR AM MAIN, DE – SOUTH OF SILENCE FEST
MAY 15 BERLIN, DE – ASTRA
MAY 17 GOTHENBURG, SE – MUSIKENSHUS
MAY 18 STOCKHOLM, SE – SLAKTKYRKAN
MAY 20 OSLO, NO – PARKTEATRET
MAY 21 COPENHAGEN, DK – A COLOSSAL WEEKEND
MAY 22 HAMBURG, DE – GRUENSPAN
MAY 23 KOLN, DE – DIE KANTINE
MAY 24 ANTWERP, BE – TRIX