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OUR NEW ALBUM 'UM AND AH' IS NOW AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD ON ITUNES. CLICK THE LINK BUTTON BELOW TO GO TO THE DOWNLOADS PAGE...



“Um And Ah” is a collection of perfectly formed tunes, each of which appear to be hewn from both the early 4AD and Californian rock movements"
Manchester Music Online.



UM AND AH UM AND AH UM AND AH UM AND AH

“Wish You Were Here – Postcards From The Samandhayleyverse”

The Sorry Kisses are a cottage industry. Like; they actually make their records in a cottage. Y’know that whole Traffic, late 60s, egalitarian ‘getting our heads together in the country’, lets go record a Big Pink-ish LP in a barn vibe? The Kisses have done that for real. ‘Bout a year ago Sam & Hayley upped sticks and quit the city for life in a tumbledown cottage someplace in the North country. They got a cat. They started growing their own vegetables. Carrots and beans and shit. The whole caboodle. Then they made an album. Sam & Hayley are sort of a dreamy pair. They spent some time out on the US West Coast a few years back and never really got over it. I guess they’re pretty sensitive kids. Now they spend alotta their time in the imagined West Coast sun-flared daze of their own minds. They’ve created a whole universe out there, you might wanna call it the samandhayleyverse. The samandhayleyverse is a pretty nice place, has an expensive LA zip code north of Sunset Boulevard. Sam & Hayley have lots of friends there, nice folk like The Beach Boys, David Crosby, Wayne Coyne and the Everly Brothers. If you’re ever passing by that way, I’m sure you’d be mighty welcome.

In the meantime, Sam & Hayley have been thoughtful enough to send us a postcard from the samandhayleyverse, in the form of their second LP Um & Ah. Um & Ah is a collection of lighty-fuzzed Californian dream-pop, belonging firmly to a tradition of off-kilter slacker US alt rock that runs from Neil Young and the early 70s folk scene to that early 4AD type sound, The Breeders and Beck. The vocals are often double-tracked, the guitars buzz and crunch and jangle and drone, the melodies are frequently exquisite. Lyrically the album deals in escape, escapism, love and friendship. Hayley handles most of the vocals. Anybody who has followed Hayley’s solo work will know that she’s a helluva singer. She’ll really knock you out.

Sometimes the sounds get pretty heavy. ‘Fake’ and ‘The Way We Were’ sound like Hole. Infact, now I think about it, alotta the LP sounds Hole. This is A Good Thing. Elsewhere The Kisses deal in wide-open Joshua Tree dust bowl balladry. There’s some really gorgeous stuff here. The opening seconds of ‘Bad Habit’ are simply heaven-sent. ‘Abandon Ship’ is an achingly beautiful song. ‘Emilie’ is as spaced as they get, drifts a little into Slumberland, shoegazey territory, though The Kisses are smart enough not to bury Hayley’s vocals in an avalanche of white noise. Maybe my fave track of all is the sole Sam-sung offering, ‘Merry Go Round’. It’s has a kick-ass chorus, and it reminds me of The Lemonheads. Infact, now I think about it, alotta the LP reminds me of The Lemonheads. This is A Good Thing.

So I guess this is where I do my album-review summing up thing. The Sorry Kisses have produced a very fine mid-90s-style country-fried slacker-pop album, and fans of cultish, DIY, home-spun sorta music may find that The Sorry Kisses have produced one of their very favourite albums of the year. It has a great vibe, a warm, intimate quality that could never be replicated in a million dollar studio. Rock & roll is a seedy, lowest-common denominator sorta scene mosta the time, placing an emphasis on all kinds shallow, soul-damaging, macho bullshit we can all do without. The Sorry Kisses offer an antidote to this. This album was made by two people in love, and you can hear it. The title Um & Ah suggests inarticulacy, but high-falutin’ words are unnecessary when a band wears its heart as firmly on its sleeve as The Sorry Kisses. The samandhayleyverse may be difficult to locate on traditional maps or Google Earth, but this album provides you with all the directions you’ll need to find your own way there. It’s a trip well worth taking.

Written by Paul ‘Fuzz’ Lowman

'Um and Ah' is available to download now through Desert Mine Music on iTunes and also on CDR via The Sorry Kisses website.

Sam and Hayley get creative at their Factory Of Unprofessional Sound...



OUR DEBUT ALBUM 'HARD DRIVE' IS STILL AVAILABLE ON ITUNES. CLICK THE LINK BUTTON BELOW TO GO TO THE DOWNLOADS PAGE...

"It's hard to pick highlights on "Hard Drive" mainly because every track is a complete, infectious example of good, edgy song writing. Buy this ? Definitely"
Manchester Music Online.

CONTACT: desertminemusic@yahoo.co.uk