Currently preparing for the release of their fourth album set for release in 2025, Rats On Rafts’ new single ‘Hibernation’ is a rain-soaked lament to nature’s battered mortality, a monochrome snapshot of the landscape played out in beautiful cold wave delay.
Finding joy in self-isolation, “I noticed that I could feel really comfortable with songs that can feel really heavy and isolated,” says frontman David Fagan “ If you listen to a Joy Division record for example, for a lot of people they’re really downcast. But for some people it’s like stepping into a really warm bath, because you can really identify with that music. I think that’s also what’s going on with ‘Hibernation’. I could identify with the coldness of the atmosphere, and that languid feeling of that song.”
Following 2021’s exceptional ‘Excerpts From Chapter 3’ with its plagues, dreams, modal guitars, and mesmerising mantras, new single ‘Hibernation’ descends further into a brooding wasteland.
“I think this song really is a good example of what our new record sounds like. Slowing everything down as much as possible gives it a lot of space. The sound of the Soundcraft 1S mixing desk we used to record the album, close to the version Lee Perry used to mix his famous black ark records, works really well for the dub side of the song but also the doom side. This song and the record in general are not romanticizing this “darkness” as much as accepting it’s part of our persona/character.” Adds David Fagan
“A talismanic band intact.” The Quietus
Along with the release of ‘Hibernation’ Rat’s have also announced a run of tour dates early next year across the UK and Netherlands.
TOUR DATES
12 Feb: Engine Room, North Shields, UK
13 Feb: Voodoo Rooms, Speakeasy, Edinburgh, UK
14 Feb: Old Hairdressers, Glasgow, UK
16 Feb: Bello Bar, Dublin, Ireland
18 Feb: The Peer Hat, Manchester, UK
19 Feb: Voodoo Daddy’s, Norwich, UK
20 Feb: The Tin, Coventry, UK
21 Feb: Prince Albert, Brighton, UK
22 Feb: Two Palms, London, UK
23 Feb: Ramsgate Music Hall, Ramsgate, UK
07 Mar: Rotown, Rotterdam, Netherlands
14 Mar: Vera, Groningen, Netherlands
15 Mar: Merlyn, Nijmegen, Netherlands
27 Mar: Stroomhuis, Eindhoven, Netherlands
28 Mar: Ekko, Utrecht, Netherlands
29 Mar: Melkweg, Amsterdam, Netherlands
03 Apr: Swamp, Freiburg, Germany
04 Apr: Kohi, Karlsruhe, Germany
05 Apr: Manufaktur, Schorndorf, Germany
06 Apr: Gold, Neu-Ulm, Germany
22 Apr: Musikbunker, Aachen, Germany
23 Apr: Goldener Salon, Hamburg, Germany
25 Apr: Schokoladen, Berlijn, Germany
26 Apr: UT Connewitz, Leipzig, Germany
