Clientele

Clientele

I Am Not There Anymore

Merge

***The Clientele’s I Am Not There Anymore regularly evokes what singer-guitarist Alasdair MacLean calls “the feeling of not being real.” Recording for the album began in 2019 and continued piecemeal until 2022—in part because of the pandemic, but also because the band wanted to experiment. “We’d always been interested in music other than guitar music, like for donkey’s years,” MacLean says. This time out, he and bassist James Hornsey and drummer Mark Keen incorporated elements of post-bop jazz, contemporary classical, and electronic music. According to MacLean, “None of those things had been able to find their way into our sound other than in the most passing way, in the faintest imprint.” This stretching out—what MacLean calls “a leap forwards and to the side”—can be heard clearly in lead single “Blue Over Blue,” with its percussive samples and its moments where the arrangement opens up suddenly into something cinemat- ic in scope, with horns and strings. MacLean says I Am Not There Anymore is all about “the memory of childhood but at the same time the impossibility of truly remembering childhood... or even knowing who or what you are.”

Clientele

Bonfires On The Heath

Merge

***BACK IN PRINT!!! Bonfires on the Heath is a return to the CLIENTELE’s roots; the dreamlike suburban landscapes first encountered in the early singles, their trippy sense of menace stronger now. Back in London, they’ve drawn on older traditions of English folk, which exist here side by side with the band’s more familiar bossa and pop elements. MEL DRAISLEY’s contributions on piano and violin add beautifully to ALASDAIR MACLEAN’s timeless, eerie songs. Instantly identifiable, the Clientele sound like no one else, although they are cited as an influence by bands as diverse as Spoon and the Fleet Foxes.

Clientele

Strange Geometry

Merge

***2005’s Strange Geometry is the first CLIENTELE album to be recorded in a fully equipped, professional studio with an established engineer/producer. The album features twelve dreamy folk-pop songs with shimmering psych guitars and string arrangements by LOUIS PHILLIPPE. The Strange Geometry vinyl repress includes a full album download, plus a six-track digital-only bonus download of songs previously unreleased. (STREET DATE - 5/06/2016)

Clientele

Suburban Light

Merge

***CHECK STOCK!!! Received a 9.1 Best New Reissue rating from Pitchfork. A reissue Suburban Light—the start of Merge’s five-album, decade-plus relationship with THE CLIENTELE. Released as a double-disc and one-LP/one-CD set, this new edition will feature not only the album in its original European tracklisting but also a revelatory set of covers, rehearsals and B-sides that reveal the earliest iterations of The Clientele. And there’s the previously unreleased “Sarah’s Prelude,” too, the lovely, lonely and abandoned opener of an album that stuns, even without the strings. LP includes a download as well.