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The Dharma Chains’ debut album Nowhere is a curation of 10 songs that have grown and evolved with the group over the past few years. The band traverses neo-psychedelia, post-punk, shoegaze and rock and roll, in a similar world to bands such as Beak>, Slowdive, EXEC, A Place To Bury Strangers and Dress Theque.
There’s a dark beauty to the songs — at moments abrasive and outright apocalyptic, at others, vulnerable and soft.
The writing and recording process for the album was also a journey in itself, with The Dharma Chain
originally setting out to record the album in an abandoned church in the Gold Coast Hinterland in Queensland, Australia. The band explain: “We brought all our own recording equipment and turned this big beautiful space into a makeshift recording studio for a precious week, during which time we wrote and recorded something like ten new tracks. We took these recordings with us in our pocket when we moved to Berlin, not long after this time.”
As the band’s time in Berlin progressed and they became inspired by their new city and immersed themselves in the thriving local music scene, they continued to write and produce new material. An exciting new sound and vision began to emerge, so The Dharma Chain headed back into the studio — this time a basement in eastern Berlin — in the heart of winter (a far cry from the sunny hills of the Gold Coast). The album became an amalgamation of songs from the original Australian sessions and from these Berlin sessions as the band explains: “We took this trip for the band and with the band, as best friends, and as collaborating artists, and this album is the result.”
At the core of The Dharma Chains’ debut album is a feeling of the simultaneous sorrow and the beauty of growth and change. It’s about the passage of time and the moment-to-moment choice we must constantly make between terror or serenity in the face of the inevitable, temporary nature of everything; ourselves, love, objects, a song. The band explains the thinking behind this; “the album could just as easily be called “Everywhere” as “Nowhere” — it’s that duality, that life/death, happy/sad, love/hate, us/them complexity at the core of the human experience. It’s about facing these changes, the inevitable and often brutal march of time, with some kind of peace and acceptance. Breathing in and then breathing out.”
Nowhere showcases The Dharma Chain’s sonic evolution, capturing the essence of a band unafraid to expand musical boundaries and redefine the psychedelic experience.
Release: June 21st, 2024, Anomic Records
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