At last! Some new material from the terrific Becky Becky, who are Gemma L Williams (ex-Woodpecker Wooliams, GhostPoet) and Peter J D Mason (ex-Fence Collective).
Five years ago, on Saturday 19th March 2016 to be precise, I was very fortunate to catch this exciting Brighton & Hove based duo performing live at The Verdict on Edward Street in Brighton. They were performing a unique one-off performance of their take on ‘Silent Shout’ by Scandinavian synth legends The Knife. Watch three and a half minutes of pure joy HERE and check out my review at the time at the foot of this article.
Now to bring us bang up-to-date, Becky Becky have announced details of their second long-player ‘Maraca’. This album is based on Becky Becky frontwoman Gemma L Williams’ short story of the same name which was first published in ‘Stim: An Autistic Anthology’.
It tells the story of a doomed relationship between a young autistic woman from England and an older Chilean man, married with children. Against the backdrop of the skyscrapers and mountains of Santiago de Chile, themes of infidelity, isolation and alienation are explored through the lyrics, while electro-pop beats are fused with a variety of incongruous musical traditions such as Chilean cueca, Italian tarantella, Spanish flamenco, salsa. The end result is ‘Maraca’, taking its name not only from the percussion instrument but also the Chilean slang for ‘whore’, an album quite unlike anything else.
‘Maraca’ is being released by Woodland Recordings over the summer as a series of EPs released via download codes on postcards before the full album drops as a Special Edition book / CD in September.The first track ‘Hey, Santiago!’ was released at the end of June and the first EP ‘The Mountain’ was released on 9th July. Watch the accompanying video for the lead track HERE. You can subscribe to the series of postcards or pre-order the new ‘Maraca’ album at becky-becky.com
Their brilliant first album ‘Good Morning, Midnight’ (which you can purchase HERE) was an adaptation of the Jean Rhys novel of the same name and was called “one of the best albums I’ve heard” by GodIsInTheTV and “a gripping voyage in the dark” by Uncut.
The running order of these new releases are thus:
‘Hey Santiago!’
2-track EP postcard release, (out 25.06.21) and described as “A love letter to a city…”
‘The Mountain’
4-track EP postcard release, (out 09.07.21) and described as “Hotels, lust, belonging, incest…”
‘The Dance’
4-Track EP postcard release, (out 06.08.21) and described as “Sex, infidelity, isolation, love…”
‘Symmetry’
4-Track EP postcard release, (out 03.09.21) and described as “Jealousy, nostalgia, anger…”
‘Maraca’
14-track LP postcard release, out (17.09.21) and described as “Doomed love…”
‘Maraca’
14-track LP Special edition book & CD release, (out 17.09.21) and described as ‘Documentary evidence…’
For further information and merch visit becky-becky.com
