Waking Aida - Full Heal: Exclusive Album Stream

Southampton based instrumental post-rock quartet Waking Aida stream their sophomore album 5 days before release, exclusively with The Independent.

Waking Aida in shades, from left to right, Alex Blease, James Matthews, James Cleary and Josh Thompson

A mere 15 months after the release of their majestic and ebullient debut album Eschaton, Waking Aida have crafted a worthy successor in Full Heal, 8 life-affirming tracks of sublime dreamy youthful post-rock.

Full Heal showcases more electronica elements to the band’s sound, whilst still retaining the syncopated palm muted notes and effervescent joy that make them sound like Waking Aida. Guitarist James Matthews says specifically of the more electronica-tinged direction, ‘It's a gradual, slightly accidental process. We wrote a few tracks with samples as the starting point - notably A Sort Of Calm, Fume and the title track. We hadn't done that very much before, our songs tended to start with a chord sequence or a bass line.’

When talking about the influences that inspired him and the rest of the band to go in that direction, James name checks some of the most exciting releases in the world of post-rock form the last couple of years. ‘Personally, I was influenced quite a lot by Vessels' transition from being a post-rock act to basically making dance music. You can hear those influences on Fume I think. Wild Light by 65daysofstatic was also an important album for me, as it has such a great warmth and continuity to it. It's like an apocalyptic blanket. We also listen to a lot of music from more traditional electronic artists like Four Tet, Gold Panda, Bonobo, Tycho, so you can maybe hear some cues from those artists in places.’

Like Eschaton, the album is once again produced by Jamie Ward, bassist of post rock heroes Maybeshewill and just like Eschaton, the songs benefit from his warm, inviting, clear production. ‘We were pretty delighted with how Eschaton turned out,’ says James. ‘Jamie adds these great little subtle touches…a bit of percussion here, a synth layer there…which really help the music bloom. He's also a real perfectionist (particularly with drums) and that means we trust him to get the maximum out of us. On this record Jamie also gave some guidance with the actual writing in a few sections. For example, we wrote some new parts in Blue Shelled and A Sort Of Calm due to specific suggestions he made, and now it's hard to believe the songs were ever different in structure.’

The video for the latest single from the album, Fume, acts as a sort-of sequel to the band’s heart-warming baby-in-a-suit promo for Glow Coin. Speaking to Already Heard, director Tom Jordan said, ‘When we did Glow Coin last year we immediately knew we wanted to do another video with (the characters) Edward and Stu. I wanted to send them on another adventure (which was) a little darker and create more of a mood. In the first half of the video it’s difficult to guess where the story is heading…then it gets sillier and sillier.’

Waking Aida support the release of Full Heal with a five date UK-Tour alongside Dialects.

Sun 4th Oct Glasgow Old Hairdressers

Tue 6th Oct Blackburn O’Garr’s Darwen

Wed 7th Oct Leicester Firebug

Thu 8th Oct Newport Le Pub

Sat 10th Oct Bristol Mothers Ruin

Full Heal is released via Robot Needs Home on 25th September. Tickets for Waking Aida’s 5-date UK Tour with Dialects are on sale now.