W.H. Lung Announce 'Vanities' LP

W.H. Lung are announcing their sophomore album Vanities, following their critically acclaimed debut LP Incidental Music, which saw glowing press in the UK including a coveted Artist To Watch feature in The Guardian, glowing reviews from London In Stereo, Line of Best Fit, The Times, Loud & Quiet, MOJO, Q, Uncut and topping year-end lists from Piccadilly Records and Resident. Vanities documents a period of change for the group. They lost a member to a move and fell more in love with dance music and the shifting sense of community and inclusivity that came with these changes.

The main songwriting unit of Tom Sharkett and Joe Evans exude positivity; an incandescent dance floor giddiness that can be felt all over Vanities. Despite being written in isolation and remoteness the album is rooted in very real physical spaces. "Manchester is a very important part of this record," says Tom Sharkett, "The White Hotel, nights like Wet Play, seeing Gerd Janson DJ at the End of Year Riot (Electric Chair) and then discovering all the amazing stuff on his label Running Back. Then when we moved to Todmorden it was the same. Seeing Andrew Weatherall down the road from our flat at The Golden Lion - it just felt like an exciting time for us and I wanted to consume as much new music as possible." Joe shares his bandmates' enthusiasm for their dance floor experiences that have fed into this record. "Vanities is a musical representation of what Tom and I crave the most now that it's been taken away from us," he says. "In simple terms, we love to dance and have both fallen deeper in love with the music that facilitates that. Because of this voracious appetite for new music and the experiences that come with that hunger, influences on the album are vast: the aforementioned Weatherall, Robyn, Todd Terje, Grauzone, Kelly Lee Owens, Helena Hauff and countless others." But the end result is something distinctly the band's own.

The first single, 'Pearl in the Palm', which the band is sharing today, was the track that kicked it all off. "A transition from the old W. H. Lung to new," says Sharkett. It marries pulsing synths, galloping drums and a vocal take that is both caramel smooth but also fervently intense. Evoking the dance-punk ethos of LCD Soundsystem and the smooth integration of synth-heavy but affecting songwriting like Yumi Zouma, with a slight 90s house edge, Vanities establishes that W.H. Lung are indeed one to watch.

"This video was shot in January across the unlikely beauty of the Irish midlands, in Co. Offaly and Co. Laois. My inexperience directing and shooting films is part of the story here. We did the whole thing on an iPhone with makeshift tripods and second-hand gimbals. It gives the video a beautifully honest, home-filmed quality.

The story speaks to a connection with nature so everything was shot outside, in the rain, in the cold, in the quiet of the early morning. There's water, there's forest, there's bog, there's a donkey. We wanted to say something about creative expressiveness too, which comes through in the amazing outfits, styled (and hand painted) by Spice Vintage. I think there's also something in the video about spontaneous living and flowing with the unexpected. Like, a balloon? I'll have a day out with it!

The song is exploring relationships, the stakes of relationships, and how that defines the individual. You can find yourself in a balloon, if you're willing to let that happen. Just like you can find yourself in another person. And you've got to go away to come back." - Joe Evans on "Pearl In The Palm."

Watch the video here:

Photo Credit: Adrian Davies

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