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Fog Surrounds Us

by Fir Cone Children

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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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  • Cassette + Digital Album

    Includes lyrics and handpainted fir cone on cassette shell.
    Purple tape limited to 10 copies.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Fog Surrounds Us via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 4 days
    edition of 10  7 remaining

      €7.50 EUR or more 

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Includes lyrics, photo inserts and handpainted elements.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Fog Surrounds Us via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 4 days

      €10 EUR or more 

     

  • Fog Surrounds Us (Limited edition green cassette)
    Cassette + Digital Album

    Includes lyrics and handpainted fir cone.
    Opaque green tape limited to 15 copies.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Fog Surrounds Us via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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Sleepy Mouth 03:44
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The Seahorse 04:19

about

PRESS

"Life-affirming. Dig into this, what energy!"
- RRRsoundZ (GER)

"Fog Surrounds Us is the kind of album that we need more of. Alexander Donat as Fir Cone Children locks into a sad, dreamy, pop sound that is as dizzyingly upbeat as it is melancholy. It’s the kind of record that can pull you from the lull of life, and for the course of 11 songs makes the lull not so heavy. 8.2" - Complex Distractions (USA)

"Donat laconically describes Fog Surrounds Us as “music that was made for cassette tapes,” and it’s not hard to hear why. With its rich, leaden dreampunk tones, the record is propelled forward with a strange, vivid urgency. It’s pop borne with the impearled weight of Candy Claws or the warm frenzy of Vivian Girls; opener “Green Fox” especially is a near-perfect noise pop song, rocking tumultuously adrift a strange sea of rough, lo-fi bittersweetness. Featuring the tempering vocals of Krissy Vanderwoude— frontwoman of shoegaze acts Whimsical and The Churchhill Garden— she and Donat interpolate the melody of “Last Christmas,” reappropriating its throughline into a pure, heartsick invocation." - Bandcamp, Tape Label Report (USA)

"Donat’s sonic labor of love has always been the odd kid down the block. There are usually more original ideas in a single Fir Cone Children album than most bands in genre can dig up in a career. 7.5"
- DKFM Shoegaze Radio (USA)

"Fir Cone Children bring out a dreamy art punk soundscape that emphasises an indie pop sensibility. The German collective also delve into the endless realms of psychedelia, shoegaze and alternative pop. It is a song that knows no boundaries and proves to be an unforgettable
encapsulation of what modern pop music should be." - Aldora Britain (UK)

"The result is a very intriguing mixture that sounds as if Ride, Wild Nothing, Pinback and Deafheaven joined their most affable side with the intention of making an accessible soundtrack to set the adventures of a child while discover the world. Each choir and each scale vibrates with innocence and the astonishment of someone who for the first time sets foot outside." - Densidad 20.25 (MEX)

"'Fog Surrounds Us' is a wonderful album that sounds like the lifeblood that Donat puts into his work in high frequency. [It's] dense as well as varied" - NEØLYD (GER)

"This really is in a genre all of its own now. [B]rings out that more fun twee sound which is borderline surf and just makes you want to get up and dance [...] If you are a fan of upbeat music or noise rock then I think you will enjoy this one. Perhaps its true beauty is in that way that it can cross those two different paths and find potential listeners on both sides." - Raised By Cassettes (USA)

"It's a sparkling offering of 11 brand new indie-rock, shoegaze-oriented post-punk episodes blending it all with some psychedelia too, ultimately sounding as what can be best described as dream-punk." - Post-Punk.com (USA)

"A harder version of shoegaze that manages to be airy and abrasive all at once, and carries a creative, eclectic spirit. A creative, energetic album from perhaps my favourite of Alexander Leonard Donat's bands." - Bliss Aquamarine (UK)

"Frenetic and highly emotional post punk. Sounds ramshackled, direct, perfect." - Shoegaze Blog (ITA)

"Comes from a creative sound workshop, from which crazy ideas gush and catchy earworms creep out. The hovering sound has a flogging beat as a basic pattern in which piano and wavy, liquid vocals exude a touch of madness." - Underdog Fanzine (GER)




INFO:

One thing you can count on in these troubled times: there’s always more trouble around the corner, and there’s a Fir Cone Children album coming once a year. The one-man dream punk project from Berlin started in 2015 with the dreamy garage punk of “Everything Is Easy” telling stories of Alexander Leonard Donat’s first daughter who was barely 2-years old then. Four years later, with album number five, the sound has changed to a fast and stormy, yet dreamy shoegaze design that includes, occasional blastbeats as much as pearly lo-fi piano indie pop - the concept, however, hasn’t changed: Donat puts his focus on his (now) two daughters and how they experience the world. It’s mainly a positively naïve mindset that is led by instinct, curiosity - and candy. But when does fairy tale fog turn into unsettling smoke? When a little kid asks you, “Are we lost?” surrounded by people watching a firework-lit sky, it shows that fears and worries belong to everyone’s lives even in moments you wouldn’t expect them. As long as caring family members and friends are around us, it’s manageable and we feel safe and sound. “Fog Surrounds Us” is about all that: sheer joy, confusion, unconditional love, sadness, expectations, bravery, bold moves, and everything that lies in between.
After all, at this stage, other things prevail: there’s the first diving experience in the sea, the first skateboard on Christmas, a potential friend moving into the house next to you, the moment you can make out faces in scratchy drawings. Celebrate the moment, stay curious! Kids know how to, and deep down you still know, too.

FFC is happy Krissy Vanderwoude lent her voice on several tracks for the third album in a row.

credits

released September 27, 2019

All music by Alexander Leonard Donat
Additional vocals by Krissy Vanderwoude (tracks 1, 4 & 5)
Art by Alexander Leonard Donat

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Blackjack Illuminist Records Berlin, Germany

CD/tape/vinyl label from Berlin, Germany

Post-punk/ Coldwave/ Shoegaze/ Industrial/ Dreampop/ Synth/ Dreampunk/ Indie/ Ambient /Drone

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