New My Majestic Star Album Released

PRLog (Press Release) – Aug 26, 2008 – Perth, Western Australia. Australian music label Hidden Shoal Recordings today announced the release of the sophomore album by Australian ambient-rock artist My Majestic Star.

Expanding upon the emotionally-stirring instrumental palette of debut album Ideas Are The Answer and the stunning follow-up EP Fining, Too Late, The Day immerses the listener in its warm, enveloping drones, woven guitars and shoegazing songcraft for 45 minutes of sonic wonder. Including the stunning single ‘and having a reason why’, which features Chris Mason’s gorgeous reverb-soaked vocals for the first time on a My Majestic Star release, Too Late, The Day is deliberately non-literal – it doesn’t so much tell a story, but rather provides a bed within which to tell your own. It is the soundtrack to a waking fiction, a soft-focus reverie.

While so many albums in this area deliberately evoke wide-open vistas and apocalyptic atmospheres, Too Late, The Day is more of an exercise in intimacy and engagement. The stunning ‘defects in sunsets’ evolves from shimmering pools of piano loops into a mesmeric ballad of startling beauty, introducing Chris Mason’s affecting vocals. The reflective melancholy of ‘meaning less’ features the aching cello playing of Miriam Braun alongside a hypnotic guitar figure and ripples of vibraphone.

The first single to be taken from the album ‘and having a reason why’ is a vertiginous wall of sound, suspended aloft with updrafts of delay and reverb alongside Chris Mason’s heavenly vocals. This is dance music for sleepwalkers and dreamers.

Both an extension of and contrast to his work as a solo artist and with Glassacre, My Majestic Star is Chris Mason’s space for exploring the emotive power of layered and manipulated guitars, piano, bass and drums, occasionally introducing his haunting voice to the mix.

“My Majestic Star’s songs reach for the sky like all the best post-rock but you never get the sense he’s trying to blow your face off... Mason steers well clear of obvious influences. He manages to make music from relative isolation that like a lot of absolutely solo work tends towards the quiet and wounded... Ideas Are the Answer is optimistic from the title on down; this a record that respects and honors our melancholy without ever falling for the fallacy that it’s a permanent state of affairs” – Stylus Magazine on Ideas Are The Answer

“In a year that’s been woefully bereft of decent instrumental guitar music, including the disappointing Mr Beast, it’s Western Australia’s Chris Mason who shines the brightest, with a collection of beautifully melodic and lovingly constructed pieces that reward repeat listens.” – Luna Kafe on Ideas Are The Answer (Top Ten Albums of 2006)

Too Late, The Day is available now on CD and in digital format. Visit the HSR Store for all availability information.

Hidden Shoal Recordings is an Australia-based independent music label that has earned a reputation for releasing exciting and engaging new independent music that is not bound by genre or style. Hidden Shoal Recordings was chosen as one of the top ten favourite labels of 2007 by Textura magazine and has been dubbed “This generation’s 4AD” by prominent New York radio host DJ Mojo.

Label Site: http://music.hiddenshoal.com
HSR Store: http://agora.hiddenshoal.com