Canvasback Music/Atlantic recording group Grouplove has announced details of their much-anticipated new album. Produced by the band’s own Ryan Rabin, SPREADING RUMOURS arrives in stores and at all online retailers on September 20.
SPREADING RUMOURS – which follows Grouplove’s acclaimed 2011 debut, NEVER TRUST A HAPPY SONG – is led by the insanely catchy new single, ‘Ways To Go’.
Grouplove came together in 2009 and soon were hailed as a great live act, both as headliners and at such international festivals as Coachella, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Outside Lands, Reading + Leeds Festivals, and Glastonbury.
NEVER TRUST A HAPPY SONG arrived in 2011, making a stellar chart debut among the top 5 on Billboard’s “Heatseekers” album chart for new and developing acts.
Produced by the band’s own Ryan Rabin, the acclaimed album was highlighted by the debut single, ‘Colours’, which received critical acclaim and climbed to the top reaches at Alternative radio.
‘Tongue Tied’, the second single from NEVER TRUST A HAPPY SONG, proved an even greater success, earning RIAA platinum certification for sales in excess of one million while spending three consecutive weeks at #1 on the Alternative airplay chart. By year’s end, the track had made history as Alternative radio’s second most-played song of 2012, following only Gotye featuring Kimbra and ‘Somebody That I Used To Know’. The third single, ‘Itchin’ On A Photograph’ also reached the Top 10 at Alternative radio.
Review:
One of the best neo-post-punk bands to emerge from the indie rock
landscape in the wake of MGMT's success, Los Angeles' Grouplove brought catchy,
buoyant melodicism to their 2011 debut, Never Trust a Happy Song. The
band's sophomore follow-up, 2013's Spreading Rumours, is an equally
kaleidoscopic if more focused album that retains all of the touchstones that
made their previous release so engaging. We still get the dual lead vocals of
guitarist Christian Zucconi and keyboardist Hannah Hooper, as well as the
infectious percussive rhythms via drummer Ryan Rabin, guitarist Andrew Wessen,
and bassist Sean Gadd. Produced by Rabin (the son of Yes guitarist Trevor
Rabin), Spreading Rumours features a set of supremely catchy songs that walk the
line between the Flaming Lips' bubbly psych rock and Smashing Pumpkins' '90s alt
crunch. However, where Smashing Pumpkins built their sound around yearning,
often darkly emotional lyrics, Grouplove make joyful, positive-minded rock.
These guys are permagrin fruitboots who play with such frenetic optimism you can
hear the smiles in their voices. As they sing on “Hippy Hill,” “I'd rather
be the dying than the rising sun/I'd rather leave my spirit for everyone” and
“I'd rather be a hippie than a hipster.” When the group's democratic
bubblegum pop free-for-all works, as on the anthemically ballsy single
“Borderlines & Aliens” and the rambling “What I Know,” the results
are euphoric, making their joy not just compelling but infectious.
All Music Guide – Matt Collar