Various – Celebrate Yourself! The Sonic Cathedral Story 2004–2024 / Deary – Aurelia EP / Emma Anderson – Spiralée: Pearlies Rearranged

Sonic Cathedral

On reaching its twentieth birthday, Nathaniel Cramp’s Sonic Cathedral label has arguably benefitted from a degree of nominative determinism. Whilst he has tirelessly championed the sacred tenets of shoegaze, it’s not been in a restrictive small chapel sect-like way, but in a very broad-church fashion.

So much so, that his year’s celebrations have taken on many manifestations; including a string of special live shows, a handsome-sized run of regular releases, a series of split 7” singles and now in the shape of a neatly-packaged but internally gargantuan 4CD boxset, christened Celebrate Yourself! The Sonic Cathedral Story 2004–2024. Electing not to follow a comprehensively chronological track-selection methodology, the collection instead captures the characteristically compelling worlds-within-a-world approach of Sonic Cathedral.

Hence, the first CD delivers a satisfyingly sprawling twenty-track set of studio-built pieces, featuring signings past and present represented by a combination of historical nuggets and deep cuts, as well as some fan-friendly alternate versions / edits and other rarities. The quality and range of this assemblage encapsulates the strength of Cramp’s A&R skills and – crucially — makes for an immersive standalone listen.

Thus, we’re treated to expansive six-string-swirling from pioneers returning in newer guises (Andy Bell, Emma Anderson, Simon Scott’s Three Quarter Skies) and courtesy of some younger disciples (Whitelands, Horsegirl, Deary et al); material from the electronic edges (Pye Corner Audio, Not Me But Us); a few acres of spectral pastoralism (Dot Allison, Cheval Sombre); wistful folk-rock interluding (Neil Halstead in pre-Slowdive-reunion solo mode); and plenty of cross-blending invention (Mark Peters, Dummy, Lorelle Meets The Obsolete, Yeti Lane).

The second disc follows Cramp’s penchant for rehabilitating the ‘90s remix culture that once circled around contemporaneous Creation and 4AD acts pre-Britpop, primarily through 12” and CD EPs. Thus, eleven regathered reworkings from prior side-outings — from many artists that appear on the first CD and a few that don’t – remould some regular Sonic Cathedral output into luminously danceable, ambiently laid-back and deeper, darker forms. Again, there is a wraparound experience to be found, rather than jumbled selection-box sequencing.

For the third volume, we’re served up with a baker’s dozen live recordings, largely extracted from previous digital and/or vinyl-only deliveries, to remind us that many of the extended Sonic Cathedral family can forge further aural pathways on stage too. Whilst also a shrewdly ordered sub-compendium that stands up to whole-sitting spins, the most noticeable highlights come via Andy Bell and Masal’s scything yet soaring run through “Hallogallo” by NEU!, Mark Peters’ eight-plus-minute makeover of his own “Sundowning”, Dean Wareham’s past-life self-reinterpretation of Galaxie 500’s “When Will You Come Home” and Slowdive’s epic rendering of Syd Barrett’s “Golden Hair”.

For the fourth and final CD, we’re into a seasonal assortment container of Christmas-related covers and curios. Although being the component of the anthology least likely to be aired outside of December, it provides label loyalists with the public service of tidily rounding-up some otherwise scattered wares that have built-up from Sonic Cathedral artists over the years into one physical place. Moreover, it’s certainly true to say that the enterprise’s most sophisticated shoegaze practitioners are rather adept at creating endearingly dreamy and drowsy delights that masterfully conjure up atmospheric mid-winter moods, with entries from Mark Peters, Three Quarter Skies, Andy Bell, Deary and Maps proving to be particularly evocative.

In short, for newly-converted and existing Sonic Cathedral adherents alike, Celebrate Yourself! is a must-buy commemoration of two decades of stubbornly resilient curation.

If that wasn’t quite enough Sonic Cathedral in your shelves for 2024, then there are two other still-fresh releases to consider too, respectively from the remerged veteran and recently discovered fledglings ends of the roster.

Thus, the anagrammatic Spiralée finds former Lush co-leader Emma Anderson allowing a raft of others to have free rein to rebuild Pearlies, her 2023 solo debut LP, from the recording space floorboards up.

Stretching from Concretism’s fizzing early-’80s-electro twist upon “The Presence”, through Julia Holter’s sublime stripped-back Another Green World-imbued inversion of “Taste The Air”, across Lorelle Meets The Obsolete’s spacey deconstruction of “Tonight Is Mine” and up to Masal’s mystic symphonic reimagining of “I Was Miles Away”, the whole end result complements the original record so well that it feels like an equally impressive alternative reality version, rather than an afterthought re-adaptation exercise.

Elsewhere, Deary’s also just-issued Aurelia EP taps into the essence and modes of presentation that made the original shoegazers and their prototype precursors so ripe for rediscovery and homage by latter-day successors. Which in this duo’s particular case, means holding back from delivering a full-length album by first finding creative feet via short-form releases.

This allows the six-track Aurelia to explore slow-building Spooky-to-Split-era-Lush slow-building (the opening title track and the closing “Dream Of Me”), churning walls of effects (“The Moth”), airy yet dense Cocteau Twins shimmering (“Selene”), Slowdive-infused spiralling (“The Drift”) and amniotic ethereality (“Where You Are”), with both warmth and mystery.

Quite where the twosome’s sound will eventually settle when it comes to the crunch of a long-playing statement is currently unclear, but for the time being such embryonic journeying is more than adequately alluring.

-Adrian-