His Name Is Alive - Hope Is A Candle - VINYL LP

Designers is a new trio by Joachim Florent (double bass), Will Guthrie (drums) and Aki Rissanen (piano). Florent and Guthrie are based in Nantes, France, Rissanen in Helsinki, Finland, and their debut album on We Jazz Records presents a band with highly original, forward-reaching sound that builds on the long tradition of the jazz piano trio, updating it successfully.

The band's second album with 4AD, recorded in Warren Defever's home studio and remixed by Ivo Watts-Russell and John Fryer (as with their debut), sees 23 songs quick-firing through emotions, with moments of soothing calm soon clashing with white noise and visceral chaos. Highlights include InchHer Eyes Were HugeInch, on which lightly strummed acoustic guitar uplift Karin Oliver's swooning, gossamer drawl; the synth-led, inquisitive and prickly InchAre We Still Married?Inch; and pensive instrumental waltz InchSiting Still Moving Still Staring OutlookingInch. A varied yet grounded compilation of new material and old (some dating back to Defever's junior high days), it finds the band entering a confident creative stride, leaving listeners enthralled by both it's beauty and darkness and proving Defever's inspired productions utterly unique. InchDark, disturbing, and beautiful [...] Held together by Warren Defever's artful production, it's 23 songs range from jealous contemplation to spiritual concerns, from gentle folk to white noise guitar outbursts. Karin Oliver's supple voice lends itself to an array of musical and emotional settings.Inch - AllMusic

A storied part of the early 4AD catalog, His Name Is Alive - the creative outlet of Michigan musician Warren Defever - was signed to the tag in 1989, after founder Ivo Watts-Russell fell in love with their dark and fragmented sonic inclinations via cassette demos sent in the post. The project's debut record, Livonia (named after Defever's hometown), was released in June 1990. While His Name Is Alive's sound was in line with the gothic echoes of labelmates Cocteau Twins and Dead Can Dance, they also had a different, nonpareil quality, something existing on the boundary of this earth and another realm further underground. It was this otherness that piqued interest and proved the fulcrum of an unpredictable sound that often changed tack before listeners could second guess.A product of nearly ten years of Defever's home recordings, produced and mixed by Watts-Russell and his This Mortal Coil collaborator John Fryer, their debut Livonia cemented the band's presence among the 4AD's well-established ethereal lineage, reinventing and refracting the 4AD sound through a prism. A study in shadows, the album examined the dual themes of love and loss, being woozily delivered as if dreamlike. When reissued a few years later in the US, the album's title track was added - a non-linear study in guitar distortion - which completed the record and is a track that now stands out as one of the band's finest moments.