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$14.54The Story
bar italia are the London based three-piece of Nina Cristante, Jezmi Tarik Fehmi and Sam Fenton.
They release their second full length of 2023, The Twits, less than six months after their acclaimed Matador debut, Tracey Denim.
The Twits was recorded by the trio over eight weeks from February 2023 in a makeshift home studio in Mallorca, and was mixed by Marta Salogni. It finds bar italiaâs economical yet evocative songcraft taking raucous, mystic, unkempt, occasionally sinister, and wholly committed turns. Songs like âmy little tonyâ, with its in-the-red riff and excitable hooks, the cathartic four-on-the-floor of âworldâs greatest emoterâ and the festival tent psychedelia of âHi-fiverâ need little in the way of exposition â these are exhilarating rock songs, if wayward and strange.
Other moments see the bandâs increasingly signature, three-act mini-dramas moving into previously uncharted territory. Cristante, Fehmi and Fenton can each manifest a different melody, mood, and cadence â at times overlapping and linear, at others unexpectedly divergent â often within the space of thirty seconds, a tag team rooted in shared language and kinship. âJelsyâ, for instance, plays out like a conversation between friends over wistful, buzzing country blues, the alternating voices at points comforting, wry and hopelessly yearning. The sinuous, slow-burning waltz of âtwistâ stands out in its bare lyricism and seems to invite each band memberâs individual take on a confessional.
While Tracey Denim was notable for its compact 2-3 minute compositions, horizontal and open-ended tracks like âShooâ ebb and flow, moving from reptilian dive-bar soloing to a palpitating two-note piano coda. âglory-hunterâ takes playful twists and turns before ending up somewhere entirely different from where it started. âReal house wibes (desperate house vibes)â and âque surpriseâ imply sleepless, noirish misadventure, while at the other end of the light spectrum, âsounds like you had to be thereâ features some of the bandâs most sweetly optimistic musical gestures yet. Closer âbibsâ is a rare instance where all three can be heard in unison, as a procession of ghostly chords and lacerating feedback bookends the groupâs most adventurous and rich set to date.
Released in May, bar italiaâs Matador debut Tracey Denim followed a string of word-of-mouth releases on Dean Bluntâs World Music label and received widespread attention from publications including The Guardian (âone of the albums of 2023 so farâ), The Times (âexcellent debut albumâ), The Observer (âArtist To Watchâ), NME ("a lasting impression thatâs all of their own making"), The Quietus (âendlessly evocativeâ) and Pigeons And Planes (âquickly establishing themselves as one of the most enticing upcoming bandsâ). Single âNurse!â was playlisted on BBC 6 Music and received spins from BBC Radio 1, Absolute Radio and NTS. The release was accompanied by a UK tour, culminating in a sold-out headline show at the ICA in London, which The Spectator described as âtransfixing⊠They just make their beautiful, off-kilter music, and let you unfold your own stories on topâ.
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Description
bar italia are the London based three-piece of Nina Cristante, Jezmi Tarik Fehmi and Sam Fenton.
They release their second full length of 2023, The Twits, less than six months after their acclaimed Matador debut, Tracey Denim.
The Twits was recorded by the trio over eight weeks from February 2023 in a makeshift home studio in Mallorca, and was mixed by Marta Salogni. It finds bar italiaâs economical yet evocative songcraft taking raucous, mystic, unkempt, occasionally sinister, and wholly committed turns. Songs like âmy little tonyâ, with its in-the-red riff and excitable hooks, the cathartic four-on-the-floor of âworldâs greatest emoterâ and the festival tent psychedelia of âHi-fiverâ need little in the way of exposition â these are exhilarating rock songs, if wayward and strange.
Other moments see the bandâs increasingly signature, three-act mini-dramas moving into previously uncharted territory. Cristante, Fehmi and Fenton can each manifest a different melody, mood, and cadence â at times overlapping and linear, at others unexpectedly divergent â often within the space of thirty seconds, a tag team rooted in shared language and kinship. âJelsyâ, for instance, plays out like a conversation between friends over wistful, buzzing country blues, the alternating voices at points comforting, wry and hopelessly yearning. The sinuous, slow-burning waltz of âtwistâ stands out in its bare lyricism and seems to invite each band memberâs individual take on a confessional.
While Tracey Denim was notable for its compact 2-3 minute compositions, horizontal and open-ended tracks like âShooâ ebb and flow, moving from reptilian dive-bar soloing to a palpitating two-note piano coda. âglory-hunterâ takes playful twists and turns before ending up somewhere entirely different from where it started. âReal house wibes (desperate house vibes)â and âque surpriseâ imply sleepless, noirish misadventure, while at the other end of the light spectrum, âsounds like you had to be thereâ features some of the bandâs most sweetly optimistic musical gestures yet. Closer âbibsâ is a rare instance where all three can be heard in unison, as a procession of ghostly chords and lacerating feedback bookends the groupâs most adventurous and rich set to date.
Released in May, bar italiaâs Matador debut Tracey Denim followed a string of word-of-mouth releases on Dean Bluntâs World Music label and received widespread attention from publications including The Guardian (âone of the albums of 2023 so farâ), The Times (âexcellent debut albumâ), The Observer (âArtist To Watchâ), NME ("a lasting impression thatâs all of their own making"), The Quietus (âendlessly evocativeâ) and Pigeons And Planes (âquickly establishing themselves as one of the most enticing upcoming bandsâ). Single âNurse!â was playlisted on BBC 6 Music and received spins from BBC Radio 1, Absolute Radio and NTS. The release was accompanied by a UK tour, culminating in a sold-out headline show at the ICA in London, which The Spectator described as âtransfixing⊠They just make their beautiful, off-kilter music, and let you unfold your own stories on topâ.
