The first time I heard Ulrika Spacek during their support show at Old Blue Last I knew this band would get far in their music career. They have this specific fuzzy sound mixed with this lovely, delicate melody that takes you somewhere else and lyrics that touch your heart. Ulrika Spacek is a five-piece band, originally formed by Rhys Williams and Rhys Edwards in Berlin, but it was when these two moved back to London that the journey began.

“We’ve combined each one with a different art exhibition, and this is something we are going to continue to do – hopefully we can now do it in some new places,” Rhys Edwards said about their self-curated nights, Oysterland, at the Dalston Victoria, where they showcased their first live performances.

 

The band released their first record The Album Paranoia earlier this year, through Tough Records in Europe and Lefse Records in the US. From the beginning the album takes the listener on a journey through Ulrika Spacek’s powerful soundscape. You can easily zone out and get lost in its time, so be careful!

The same may happen when you get to see the band live. The psychedelic visualisations during their shows may totally overwhelm you. “There’s A Little Passing Cloud In You” shakes with its psychedelic structure and gentles guitars that can make you collapse into a fallacious sense of security from the beginning. “Strawberry Glue” is a fuzzy masterpiece, featured with home-made video clip. Beginning as an instrumental slow-burner, “Beta Male” plunges into vocal simplicity around the halfway, masterfully accenting its distorted nature. ”She’s a Cult” is probably my favourite track from the record. The song is like a cross-pollination of hypnotic fuzz!

Ulrika Spacek were invited to support DIIV on their European tour by Cole himself, unfortunately, the tour ended really quick for the band.

“We got seven [shows on the DIIV tour] and we should have had 24. So it was disappointing, in the end” Edwards said.

However, the band is hitting the stages at some of the most important psychedelic festivals in Europe this year and their headline show at the Waiting Room a little while back was SOLD OUT. Meanwhile, Rhys and the band are knuckled down in their home studio working on album number two.

-Emily Slupecka

Go and check out these guys, if you haven’t done it yet:

17 Jun 2016 – 18 Jun 2016   Best Kept Secret Festival   Hilvarenbeek, Netherlands

Sun 19 Jun 2016   Paris International Festival of Psychedelic Music 2016   Noisiel, France

Sun 19 Jun 2016   Paris International Festival of Psychedelia 2016   Paris, France

Mon 20 Jun 2016   Tröne   Brussels, Belgium

Tue 21 Jun 2016   TRIX Centrum voor Muziek   Antwerp, Belgium

Thu 30 Jun 2016   Musiques En Stock Festival   Cluses, France

Sat 06 Aug 2016 – Thu 11 Aug 2016   Visions 2016   London, UK

Sun 14 Aug 2016 – 23 Sep 2016   La Route Du Rock 2016   Saint-Malo, France

Sat 24 Sep 2016   Liverpool International Festival of Psychedelia 2016   Liverpool, UK

Sun 25 Sep 2016   The Cellar   Oxford, UK

Sun 25 Sep 2016   Cellar Bar   Oxford, UK

Sun 25 Sep 2016   Cellar Bar, Oxford   Oxford, UK

Tue 27 Sep 2016   Electrowerkz   London, UK

Tue 11 Oct 2016   King Georg   Cologne, Germany

Wed 12 Oct 2016   The Green Door Store   Brighton, UK

Thu 13 Oct 2016   Soup Kitchen   Manchester, UK