The follow-up to 2019's Wheeltappers and Shunters, was recorded in an old studio on Merseyside during the summer of 2019, with good vibrations seeping into the grooves, “Clinic look to a brighter future,” reveal the band in a soundbite. It will be released on 22 October through Domino Records. Pre-order your copy here.
Referencing H.G. Wells’ Things to Come, Marshall McLuhan’s The Medium is the Massage and Sombrero Fallout by Richard Brautigan, the themes Clinic explore on Fantasy Island are time, music and entertainment. In a (coco) nutshell, Clinic have gone funky disco, broadening their sonic palette with the addition of several new gadgets including an electronic acid bass machine, a 1970s cocktail rhythm unit, a Casio digital horn and space drum.
Elsewhere on the album, Clinic cover Ann Peebles’s “I Can’t Stand The Rain” in a delirious manner. “It’s a tin of fruit cocktail,” says one of the band, and there is definitely a lighter, more escapist mood to Fantasy Island. As well as the Human League, other musical influences on the album include Fun Boy Three, Kid Creole and the Coconuts and early 1980s pop music, but also Italian Cosmic disco mix tapes and primitive busker elements, such as the Memphis Jug Band and old blues music, which balance the sound and give Fantasy Island its raw energy. Only Clinic are capable of pulling these disparate references together to make a cohesive, thrilling whole with mixing duties handled by Claudius Mittendorfer (Parquet Courts, Neon Indian).
Fantasy Island Tracklist:
Check out the album's tracklist and watch the video for its title track below.
Fantasy Island Tracklist:
01. The Lamplighter
02. Fine Dining
03. Take A Chance
04. Refractions (In The Rain)
05. Dreams Can Come True
06. Miracles
07. On The Other Side...
08. Fantasy Island
09. I Can't Stand The Rain
10. Feelings
11. Hocus Pocus
12. Grand Finale
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