LILACS & CHAMPAGNE – MIDNIGHT FEATURES VOL I: SHOWER SCENE

Midnight Features is a new series of “fantasy records” imagined by Lilacs & Champagne’s Emil Amos and Alex Hall. Inspired by the classic Marvel comic series What If?, the duo seek to place themselves into various musical eras, expanding and perverting each new stylistic context they land in. This first volume, Shower Scene, was inspired by the background music from 1970s TV shows – the frenetic solos, sleazy funk lines and jazz-influenced sounds that subtly lurk behind the tales of crime, drama and passion. The band scratch beneath the soft-focus surface of this era, discovering a darker, more realized territory. Shower Scene is also the first release to feature Lilacs & Champagne playing as a live band. The expanded line-up (Zac Reno-bass/sampler & Ash Black Bufflo-keys/piano) blends live instrumentation with sample-based songs, breathing a fresh new sensibility into their sound. However the clever stylistic hybridity that marked their earlier releases remains intact, with new sonic palettes explored and experimented with on every track. On “Sensations” the band sound like a blazing, psych-jazz imagination of The Soft Machine, whereas “Maple Street” approximates the avant-jazz Moondog might have made if he’d lived into the era of sampling.