The Speed of Sound “Underground”

Manchester indie rock / power pop outfit The Speed Of Sound present their new single ‘Underground’, the first stunning glimpse of the album ‘A Cornucopia: Victory’, the second disc in their three-album set ‘A Cornucopia: Minerva, Victory, Bounty’. This trilogy makes for the band’s second release via California’s Big Stir Records.

Full of ambition, energy and melodic brilliance, the band is offering this new three-album collection as a deluxe edition on vinyl and CD. Earlier, they shared four singles from ‘Minerva’ – the hauntingly spacious ‘Trickledown’, the stratospherically vast ‘The Great Acceleration’, the uplifting ‘Mind Palace’, and ‘West Wind’, where a recklessly fast rhythm merges with a Wagnerian horn section.

Following 2021’s critically acclaimed album ‘Museum Of Tomorrow’, the band returns triumphant, defiant and redemptive with this trilogy, marking their 35th anniversary. The first disc ‘Minerva’ displays joyous belligerence in the face of a dominant mainstream music machine. In contrast, ‘Victory’ is more laid back and relaxed while retaining an optimistic upbeat and lively feel.

Most music is never even recorded, and most recorded music remains unheard. ‘Victory’ is a celebration of this unheard underground music and the counterculture itself – music made for the pleasure of making it (rather than for artless corporate entities). This is music that sees the mere act of existence as both rebellion and also success.

The Speed Of Sound creates music laden with optimism and lyrical bite, tapping the DIY ethos of punk and the restless lust for experimentation of psychedelia. Formed in 1989 with a pre-history dating back to the day Andy Warhol died in 1987, their music has always been idiosyncratic, counter-intuitive and perpetually looking for something new. Today The Speed of Sound is made up of father and son John Armstrong (guitars and vocals) and Henry Armstrong (keyboards), Ann-Marie Crowley (vocals and guitar), Kevin Roache (bass guitar) and John Broadhurst (drums).

“Can you hear the unheard music? This is subterranean dance-rock with an insatiable groove in celebration of independent music. The theme of non-mainstream creativity is present throughout the three linked albums of A Cornucopia; ‘Underground’ is where it is all explicitly pulled together. Immunity from the toxic tentacles of major labels and ‘the music business’ gives a freedom of expression simply not possible from within the machine,” says frontman John Armstrong.

“The ‘We’ stated in ‘We are the underground’ is a collective ‘We’ – not just The Speed Of Sound – instead the ‘We’ is made up of every single independent artist across the planet. Together ‘We’ are all the Underground and ‘We’ are defiantly proud of our existence beyond the exclusive major label ‘club’. ‘We’ have the power to just do our thing and get on with it!”

The ‘Victory’ album includes 14 wide-ranging pieces of unheard and highly contagious fresh and unexpectedly shape-shifting grooves. From the supremely danceable ‘Underground’ through the unabashed sensuality of ‘Monsoon’ to the gothic lounge jazz of ‘Permafrost’ and the strangely linked pairing of ‘Apocalypse Acropolis’ and ‘Apocalypse Metropolis’, they offer something special here.

From the hypnotic orange-and-sandalwood scented wisps of masala rock in ‘Rock Paper Scissors’, acoustic powered spaceflight ‘in From The Cradle To The Stars’ and the reckless garage punk punch of ‘Go For It’, it becomes clear. There is the data scraping warning of ‘X-Y Axis’, the post-nostalgia of ‘The Same River’,and swaggering rock with a pinch of Brazilian sway in ‘A Walk By The Sea’, while ‘E to F’ displays glam rock tendencies and a pinball metaphor before the soaring harmonies of ‘Empathic Reaction’ and ending with the triumphant shimmering elegance of ‘Tranquility Falls’.

With their genre-defying style, The Speed Of Sound expand from their foundation of 1960s, punk and new wave influences, encompassing wide dynamic and stylistic variation, crossing borders and pushing boundaries at every opportunity. Their music bursts with experimentation whilst retaining hooks and melodic sensibility, plus sharp barbed wit, lyrical depth and all-pervading sense of joy.

As of July 23, ‘Underground’ is available everywhere digitally, including Apple Music, Spotify and Bandcamp, where ‘Minerva’ and the full trilogy ‘A Cornucopia: Minerva, Victory, Bounty’ can also be obtained on CD or vinyl. The ‘Victory’ album will be released on September 20 and the ‘Bounty’ album shall be released later this year.

-Official bio