LCD by Ummagma

Ummagma

“LCD” [Septembre 22, 2017]

Genere: alternative, dream pop, indie pop, indie rock, indietronic, shoegaze

Base: Canada

Label / Booking:
Label Obscura / Somewherecold Records / Shameless Promotion PR

bio / about

Canadian-Ukrainian dreampop duo Ummagma has released their ‘LCD’ EP, involving collaborations with two of the producers who shaped their musical stylings. Cocteau Twins multi-instrumentalist Robin Guthrie, presents his mix of ‘Lama’, while two tracks – ‘Back To You’ and title track ‘LCD’ get deep dark and delicious reworkings by maverick electronic producer Dean Garcia, famed as half of seminal British indie/alt-rock band Curve with iconic vocalist Toni Halliday and half of SPC ECO with Rose Berlin.

The original version of ‘LCD’ is a psychedelic trip blissfully girating somewhere between MGMT and Beach House. Dean Garcia’s re-envisioning of this track is a twisted hypnotic bell-infused version, rounding out a release that encompasses a great spectrum of sonic sound and gorgeous textures.

This EP follows up January’s ‘Winter Tale’ maxi-single released with 4AD dreampop pioneer A.R.Kane, also famed for his M/A/R/R/S ‘Pump Up The Volume’ release.

Ummagma is Shauna McLarnon, hailing from Canada, and Alexander Kretov, originally from Ukraine. Now based in Canada, Ummagma won the Alternative Eurovision on Amazing Radio, representing Ukraine among 23 countries, and has also been featured in a full page spread in Rolling Stone Russia.

Neither Robin Guthrie nor Dean Garcia require any introduction. The producer mastermind behind Cocteau Twins, Guthrie is also co-founder of the Bella Union record label, along with Simon Raymonde. Dean Garcia is renowned for sculpting alternate-universe pop hits that simultaneously straddle several genres. Apart from 15 years with Curve and a decade with SPC ECO, Garcia has also toured the world several times and recorded multiple albums with such established artists as Eurythmics, Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, Bryan Ferry, Sinead O’Connor and Ian Dury.

“When listening to the original versions of these two songs, I wanted to make something that was an extension of the psyche n space mood that to me is the heart n soul of Ummagma,” explains Dean Garcia. “The band appeal to my psychedelic nature.”

“With the ‘LCD’ mix it was a matter of going into the original stems and extracting the most trippy n spacey elements and expanding them into a different zone. ‘Back To You’ was more about enhancing the mood of the song as it stood, but with view to bring out its dark and foreboding nature. I enjoyed working on both mixes for different reasons, the sense of space and oddness within both mixes is the thing that glues it all together. File under Dark Psyche”