Twelve Days In June Archive
Twelve Days In June
Stone Tape Theory
Stone Tape Theory, the sixth TDIJ album, is one of the biggest records I’ve heard in a long time, an absolutely pummeling train ride through Hulegaard’s mind, and the world we all find ourselves trapped in at the moment.
From the outset, with “Another Dusk, Another Dawn”, it’s all there. The scope, the delicious riffs, a wall of sound where nothing sounds muddy and everything has a place, the melody, the solos. It’s so satisfying to hear a record and think “he got exactly the sound he wanted - this must be what it sounded like in his head”.
“Bereft” might have been the best song on at least one album of each of Dave’s heroes. I never know where to even focus when this song comes on. The astonishing drum performance? The way the multiple guitar tracks continually change the depth of focus and lead you through the track? Putting a song like this in 10th position on an album of 12 songs means you have more gold than you know what to do with.
In the closer “Echoes”, around the 5 minute mark, Dave gives the people (well, me) what they really want. He plays us out with one of those face-bludgeoning guitar solos, just to make sure you don’t forget that you just took the musical equivalent of a motorcyle ride down the walls of the Grand Canyon.
Despite its regularly morose, melancholy, and pensive subject matter, I found Stone Tape Theory to be, at root, a deeply joyful experience. This is a human being - a team of them, in fact - creating something that can only come from incredibly sharp minds dedicated to something beautiful, years of experience and dedication and skill in service of a vision, emotional honesty, and love.
I love Twelve Days in June, and I fucking love this record.
Twelve Days In June
From Now On
TDIJ recently dropped the devastating Stone Tape Theory, one of our favorite releases of the year. This new EP entitled From Now On comes as a welcome surprise, 4 new tracks from the Stone Tape sessions that didn’t make the cut - a testament to the rich well of material TDIJ is mining.
There’s a nice spread of vibes here, the opener “My Beacon Has Gone Out” probably the purest hit of what, for us, defines TDIJ. The earnest lamentation delivered over walls of howling guitar, intensely heavy yet deeply melodic, backbreaking and beautiful at the same time.
“Soothe” is a rollicking sledgehammer of sludgy riffs with a devilish vocal. The thunderous rhythm section underpins a droning guitar in the verse before the whole thing takes off into a chorus that’s deceptively pretty, and walks us right up to the precipice where it all tumbles back to the start on the cue of Dave singing “my cold dead heart”. You can hear just how Corgan would’ve sung it, and it’ll make you smile.
“Malaise” starts off sounding like it could’ve been on a later Misfits record, so impenetrable is the wall of guitar, so troubador-y the melody. By the time you get to the chorus, there’s too much typical TDIJ depth being slathered on for that comparison to hold up. “I reject one nation under Fraud” is, by the way, one hell of a line.
It all wraps up with “Believe”, an airy and sumptuous hymn drenched in reverb and carried by synths, nary a pounding drum or screeching guitar to be found. “I don’t believe in much, I don’t believe in faith, but I believe in love" is a bit of driftwood we can hold onto through the morose landscape of this record, and of reality.
There is nothing on this EP that wouldn’t have fit just fine in Stone Tape Theory, and it’s a delight to have another chunk of new music from one of the finest artists in the landscape.
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