audiobooks Reach New Peaks of Creativity on their New Album ‘Astro Tough’, due for Release in October – Until Then, Enjoy Album Opener ‘The Doll’ and its Accompanying Video

audiobooks is David Wrench and Evangeline Ling – the former being a multi-instrumentalist and super-producer/mixer, known for his work with Frank Ocean, the xx, Caribou, David Byrne, Manic Street Preachers, and Goldfrapp, while writer, vocalist, and visual artist Ling is as chameleonic as she is charismatic, able to jump from detachment to rawness to aggression to tenderness to hilarity to toe-curling awkwardness, sometimes within the same song. This October, the duo will release their second album, Astro Tough – a record that brims with energy. On this ten-track collection, their roles diverge more clearly than on their debut, with Wrench handling almost all the music, Ling the lyrics, and vocals. In anticipation of the release, the pair have shared album opener, ‘The Doll’ accompanied by a Paul Kelly-directed video.

Based on a childhood memory infused with ambiguity and open to interpretation, ‘The Doll’ is a bereavement curve set to music and deals with the stages of grief from loss and denial to acceptance. The accompanying video depicts a child exploring typically crowded spaces left empty during the pandemic in South London and Kent.

“I had the idea for ‘The Doll’ video while out for a walk,” Wrench explains. “I was watching a child walk confidently, checking their surroundings, taking it all in. I started to recall how the world used to look as a child. I was lucky to grow up in the countryside and to be able to walk alone in nature. My father was a sportsman (he won a Commonwealth medal for Wales for Weightlifting) and a PE teacher, so I used to go with him and spend time in empty sports venues. There is a special atmosphere to places built for crowds when they are empty. It struck me that a video based on a child exploring these empty spaces and finding something that had been lost would make a really fitting film for our track ‘The Doll’.”

audiobooks threw absolutely everything at their 2018 debut album, Now! (in a minute) – a hectic, head-spinning blast of freewheeling freak-pop genius. On its follow-up, Astro Tough, due for release on October 1^st, 2021 via Heavenly Recordings, they’ve somehow found a way to ramp things up even further, concentrating their chaotic energy and inherent weirdness into a record that’s bigger, deeper, and more powerful than even its predecessor.

On Astro Tough, audiobooks are completely sincere. They’re also completely joyous, wild, angry, powerful, hilarious, vicious, vulnerable and intense, and most of all completely brilliant. It’s the sound of David Wrench and Evangeline Ling reaching new peaks of creativity, more confident than ever before in their abilities to forge something focussed, singular and unique out of the explosive combination of their talents.

Endlessly forward-thinking, it says a lot that they’re already fixated on what’s next. “The conversation never stops,” says Wrench. “Even earlier today we were talking about ideas, a whole list of new things to try in the creative process. We’ve already got more songs that aren’t quite finished, but are really strong.”

“I’m just dying to get back into the studio,” adds Ling. “I can’t wait to get back with David and get writing again.”

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