(INDIE/DREAMPOP) Oracles emerged from long-held friendships and musical cross-pollination via hazy bedroom sessions in the summer of 2013.
They recorded and mixed their first EP ‘Stanford Torus’ in basements and closets between their hometowns of Berlin and Cologne, Germany. The six songs touched on the multitudes of musical interests and activities each member brought to the band – psychedelia and shoegaze, Krautrock and early electronica, Highlife, Afrobeat as well as classic Disco. All of this moldedinto a wash of tape saturation created a music of a blissful yet somber warmth like a bonfire on a pitch-black and deserted plain. Soon after, ‘Stanford Torus’ was released via Clouds Hill Recordings and garnered some international recognition: ‘Our new favourite psyche pop band’ (The Quietus); ‘They’re shit-hot!’ (Pete Doherty); ‘Buzz Band Of The Week’ (NME).
In the period to follow, a few things started to fall in place for Oracles: two German headline tours, supports shows for The Libertines and Allah-Lahs, festival appeareances at Reeperbahn Festival, c/o Pop, Dockville, Immergut, Maifeld Derby, Puls Festival, Way Back When, Appletree Garden, Copenhagen Psych Fest among others and invitations to New York City’s CMJ Music Marathon, Austin’s SXSW and Brighton’s The Great Escape followed in a frame of just one and a half years.
Meanwhile, ideas piled up, as did unexpected yet standard business moves. In an instant, the band found themselves left to their own devices. A long search yielded a beautiful farmhouse in Northern Germany, to which they withdrew for three cold weeks to record among cattle, horses and howling winds. Each day in the old stables was commenced by the sparking of the fireplace – and twelve songs were to unwind in this process of self-recording and -producing.
‘Bedroom Eyes’ is Oracles’ first longplaying outing. It’s taken from a lyric of the upbeat, sphynxian ‘Thoughts Of Love On The Verge Of Sleep’. The title does a good job of sketching what Oracles embody on their debut album: examining, bemoaning and celebrating their lives and loves with all the fissures, losses, turns and joys with one dissecting and one passionate eye.
