Perth-based rockers Rag n’ Bone are ready and waiting to uncork their monster of a debut album A Handful of Ash tomorrow (Friday, March 3rd) and in celebration, Music Feeds is thrilled to be on board for the record’s exclusive pre-release stream.
Taking on such universal and all encompassing themes such as loss, love, morality, politics, and relationships A Handful of Ash spans nine powerful tracks packed with compelling lyrical intensity and turbulent, teetering-on-the-edge-of-your-seat, action. With the album, Rag n’ Bone are articulating the frustrations so many of us have in today’s fraught socio-political climate.
“A Handful of Ash is our way of dealing with the big shit: love, loss, communication, family, disappointment, elation and tape delay,” explain the band.
“Through no fault of our own, the songs became interwoven and entangled: ‘Paul’ was the first song written for the record, after we lost an uncle through a slow, painful death – what happens to one’s stuff when they die? All of its value was seemingly attached to it by the owner – it was this thought process that made the rest flood out.
“‘Pissy Flow’ is kinda a bastard of a thing, a fight between your inner most thoughts and desires and their terrible, horrible actions and consequences; ‘Last Kind Words’ is a family mirror imaged of R.Crumb’s on a rolling train and ‘Mon Coeur’ is kinda like a Jackson Pollock splatter painting in microcosm; while ‘Memory’s Cenotaph’, ‘Solitude’, ‘Tall Ships’ and ‘I Don’t Feel At Home in This World Anymore’ all and one deal with issues such as gender identity, sense of place, history and our country’s sense of value attached to its neglect of history. It’s also a chance to really stretch and explore the means and ways of a four-piece rock band.”
The album was recorded over 10 days, helmed by producer and engineer Dave Parkin (Jebediah, Tired Lion) at Blackbird Studios. “A lot of the songs had become a part of our live set for a while but we didn’t want to feel any resistance to changing them in the studio,” recount the band.
“Instead we tried to come at them from new angles and this resulted in songs changing for the better, some getting new lyrics added to them or completely new sections and some just getting really weird bits like recorded drawers of dropped cutlery or a single line played on a toy Casio – just whatever seemed fun and interesting! The experience also involved lots of stupid banter, bonding and the almighty pancake challenge between Axel & Parko (you can watch this on our Instagram).”
Rag n’ Bone will launch A Handful of Ash on March 18th at Perth’s Jack Rabbit Slim’s, with further Australian tour dates on the horizon.
“We think the album really captures our energy as a band and hope that listeners are able to get a sense of who we are from the album. We also really tried to put all the songs in an order that made sense of a journey, whatever that could mean for the listener.”
Stream the powerful record here in full, before its release tomorrow, Friday 3rd March.
