GROUPER "Way Their Crept" --- CONTACT

Rerelease of an older single:

https://www.discogs.com/Grouper-Water-People/master/878532

But yes, nice to see!

ah yes

Nice! Water People is a fantastic song.

two older releases on Spotify that I hadn't previously noticed - Violet Replacement part 1 and 2

Both one album length track

i fell asleep to both of those (along w/ alien observer) every night for a year

part of that was released on vinyl:

https://www.discogs.com/Grouper-Sleep-Fragment/release/3808592

so good

man i'd ruin a needle so quick with that one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLsutIhq3_o

she is playing here next month which is something i never really expected to happen and i am beyond excited

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eT0iL_7avQA

https://grouper.bandcamp.com/track/children

New Grouper! It's a Ruins outtake. All proceeds in the next 24 hours go towards the Silvia Rivera Law Center, Transgender Law Center and Trans Assistance Project

Beautiful song

just got an email from yellowelectric, there's a bunch of old inventory up on her bandcamp. i got the Alien Observer LP for $30, only 8 left!

Good new interview

https://www.emilyelhaj.com/lovelionmusic/2017/09/interview-with-liz-harris-of-grouper.html

And she's playing here in SF in a couple of weeks.

whoa, i wonder what this is:

I recently licensed a song to a television show [you guys are going to flip].

great interview btw, thanks for sharing ned

What is your dream job outside of playing music?

My dream job is not performing music. Most of my job ideas are more non-paying adventures than careers. I took a career test in my twenties and remember “related to the spirituality or the occult/religious leader” and “sailor." I’ve followed through on “sailor” --- I love very much being on the water. I do sailing races on my friend’s boat every summer in Astoria and am looking into getting a small boat with an electric outboard to toot around the Columbia River.

I’d like to get a shit job on a container ship or find a sailboat to crew on and do a trans-oceanic voyage at some point before I die. I volunteer at a National Park here in Astoria. Basically, I just pick up trash and kick rocks off the trails but I get to wear a uniform and use a walkie-talkie which is about 80% of the pleasure if I’m entirely honest. I’d really like to drive in a car race or demolition derby. I’d like to be paid to walk around or hike. My month-long hiking trip in New Zealand two years ago definitely cost me money though so still some work to be done there I guess. So far, as paying jobs go -- I spent my 20’s working with differently abled adults and I miss it every day. I love care-work, with children, elders, animals, whomever. It feels challenging and rewarding in a straightforward way that music doesn’t.

And she's playing here in SF in a couple of weeks.

I will be at early show. :)

Same here!

i'm still deciding whether i'm going to the early show or the late show depending on if i want to catch JEANNE DIELMAN showing at BAMPFA that same evening

Go to both shows

okay, i chose the early show -- say hello if you see someone roughly 5'6 with a buzzed head

old items getting restocked is great and all but shit i got two email notifications from bandcamp on my phone today saying "New Items from Grouper" and each time I got super excited thinking a new single from a possible upcoming album was on it's way, but no :(

nothing on a new single and/or album (though she's doing a project that will be performed during this year's Unsound), but a very nice interview: https://lovelionmusic.blogspot.com/2017/09/interview-with-liz-harris-of-grouper.html

what i did get to hear of liz last night was lovely . . . but, dearest brooklyn scenesters, why would you go to a grouper show . . . and talk the whole way through it? ugh

― reggie (qualmsley), Sunday, April 17, 2011 9:03 AM (six years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i read this post and immediately knew which show this was

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQO3iISbSqA

fucking crowd sucks

Same thing happened at DARK MOFO in Hobart until someone a few rows from the front turned around and bawled SHUT THE FUCK UP. I love Grouper irrationally, but I often listen to the music at overwhelming volume for the sensory overload feeling, and I was looking forward to being able to lose myself in the live performance. It was beautiful but I kept getting distracted by fuckheads more interested in themselves than the music they'd paid to see, and I couldn't help wishing for a little help from the stage. I understand what's special about a room of hushed people listening to soft music, but if I'm completely honest it feels a little wilful to play that quietly.

I'll get me coat.

I know, she plays very quietly. I saw her in a chapel at UVA two years ago that held 250 people, & even with a completely silent & reverential crowd, it was remarkably quiet in the back. I felt like I was straining to hear during the set.

when i saw her it was a perfect volume, loud & encompassing without being uncomfortable

Thankfully the show the other day here was 1) fantastic 2) had a deathly quiet audience and we were all the happier for it.

Did you recognize any of the material she played? Or was it all one lovely gauzy blur?

I definitely recognised things - maybe 2-3 songs - but often radically rearranged (e.g. Ruins material played as guitar ostinatos, recognised them from lyrics).

also continuous, beautiful projected images behind the stage - thematically matched to what I think about her music, which is like hazy memories of beautiful songs.

she played "holding" from RUINS and "fishing bird" from DRAGGING A DEAD DEER

Fishing Bird???? whoa. that's pretty remarkable. was Holding the guitar arrangement? when I saw her 2 years ago, she opened with Alien Observer and played mostly Ruins stuff like Holding and Labyrinth (complete with microwave beep).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XyJB1qq9zw&

I’ve always wondered are the dark circle under her eyes makeup or she doesn’t sleep that much? In some pictures they look natural but they keep changing size and then in others she doesn’t seem to have them at all.

she did say that the Sleep piece was performed/recorded after a long period of sleeplessness. but i had a friend that had a similar thing, it’s genetic.

her collaborator Paul Clipson has died. they did a lot of amazing work together.

vimeo.com/109943175

Paul Clipson - a criminally unsung luminary of the moving image - has died. His images, layers upon layers of light and energy and feeling has been an inspiration.
Very sad news. pic.twitter.com/3721ZHdLUg

— Scott Barley (@ScottBarleyFilm) February 5, 2018

RIP

when I saw her last year his work was projected above her and it was rather incredible

Likewise, I'm sad that it took this loss for me to find out who'd made those beautiful images.

Hoping for a new album this year.

🙏🙏🙏

btw

The Sound They Make At Night - GROUPER - AIA Dream Loss, Alien Observer POLL

Every time I see this thread pop up I pray that it's new Grouper music getting announced. Ruins was all the way back in 2014!

this all fits in my with my theory that everything that is good has been frozen in time (see stars of the lid)

Didn't she say something at one point about being finished with the Grouper project? (Though before last year's seven inch, I think)

It was in one magazine interview that I heard more talk about than the interview or even quote itself... but I do remember reading the exact quote. It wasn't entirely clear and was probably taken out of context and blown out of proportion and the whole "she's retiring Grouper" bit went thru a game of telephone. having said that, yeah, since 2014 she's only put out 3 songs: the Paradise Valley 7" (recorded in 2012), and "Children," an outtake from Ruins (recorded in 2011). So we haven't even heard anything recorded past 2012.

What year was Helen?

single in 2012, album in 2015. but Helen isn't Grouper.