"Rodney Cromwell's music belongs to the future" ~ NME
"This music is based on our common human experience, with all its joys, quirks and misgivings. A brilliant track – thank you Rodney Cromwell. We’ll take a dish of your cool-flowing retro synth delight with pleasure" ~ THE SPILL MAGAZINE
"Yanking the mundane into the sublime. Its sweeping synths transverse a sonic landscape bridging an ancient sentiment and an almost folk instrumentation with pure hertz tone glory" ~ POST-PUNK.COM
“His new lo-fi disco laments are joyfully simple and painfully funny” ~ HUFFINGTON POST
"Makes a delightful lo-fi synthpop racket with a load of old gear and a deep appreciation of classic outfits" ~ ELECTRONIC SOUND
“A reminder of good pop tunes from a magical era” ~ LOUDER THAN WAR
London-based synthpop artist Rodney Cromwell has released his new 'Memory Box' EP, a 4-track offering that includes the original version of 'Memory Box', plus the ambient track 'Memory Stops', plus two strikingly different remixes. This is the first music Cromwell has released in 2 1/2 years.
This song about our perceptions of reality and the certainty of our memories lends to the question "How do we believe anything in a world where truth and honesty are of so little worth?"
Düsseldorf / Shanghai krautrock band MOOD TAEG offer a discordant re-interpretation reminiscent of the avant-pop of Stereolab or the European coldwave of Ladytron. The second mix, by Retrosynth Records artist AUW, is slice of dark synthwave, pitched somewhere between Kavinsky and Pye Corner Audio.
Rodney Cromwell is the nom de plume of Adam Cresswell, founding member of 1990s-2000s indie-folktronica band Saloon (who had four entries in John Peel’s Festive 50, recorded three Peel Sessions and had top 10 album of the year in The Sunday Times) and one half of electronic two-piece Arthur & Martha (praised by the likes of NME, The Guardian and Artrocker).
With minimal percussion, Rodney Cromwell's lyrics float over a bed of vintage synthesizers and effected guitar. Shunning a clean '80s synth sound, the song is almost psychedelic in outlook, reminiscent of the minimal synth of acts such as Broadcast, Pram or Silver Apples. The video, an atmospheric montage of heavily effected and distorted shots of rural Britain, was inspired by film auteurs such as Stan Brakhage and Chris Marker.
Writing and recording in his home studio in Catford, South London, Cromwell employs an old-school approach using predominantly vintage hardware. Mixed and co-produced by Richard Bennett at Acme Hall Studios (New York) and mastered by Pete Maher (U2, Goldfrapp, Paul Weller, Pixies, The Alarm), Martin J Langthorne, who also designed the album artwork, contributes guitar.
"It was one of the first songs written for the new album. At the time I was still disorientated from illness. I turned on the TV and there was Boris Johnson’s lackey, Dominic Cummings, spinning some yarn. In my post-fever state he came across like Wormtongue from Tolkein, talking about riverbanks, woods and castles while literally sitting in a perfumed rose garden like in Alice in Wonderland. I wouldn’t say that influenced me directly, but certainly my own state of brain-fog sent my writing off in a more heady and fantastical direction," explains Adam Cromwell.
"I wanted the song to have the feel of a marching clockwork toy, so the beat is really simple and metronomic with the synths doing the talking by enveloping the song."
On February 21, Rodney Cromwell will release the full-length ‘Memory Box' album, a mixture of electronic hauntological excursions, dreampop and European coldwave. Using analogue synths, drum machines with parts played almost entirely live (with minimal computer sequencing) and vocals recorded without autotune, this record conjures up an organic, albeit dream-like, world that is inspired as much by Alice in Wonderland, Franz Kafka and Anna Kavan as it is by its sonic influences such as Kraftwerk, The Cure and Stereolab. The sonic pallet of 'Memory Box' is both reassuringly familiar and completely distinctive.
Rodney Cromwell's debut LP 'Age of Anxiety' (2015) and 'Rodney's English Disco' EP (2018) have garnered Rodney Cromwell features in Electronic Sound Magazine, NME, Huffington Post, Paste, Record Collector, BBC6 Music and national RNE3 in Spain, for whom he also recorded a live session. The debut album featured in scores of Best of Lists including Electronic Sound Magazine and he was named 'Most Promising New Act' by The Electricity Club. He has appeared on compilations alongside Cavern of Anti-Matter, John Foxx, Devo, OMD, Katy Perry and other notable artists.
Rodney will be playing a handful of live dates to support the album's release. His debut festival appearance at Indietracks 2015, described as 'a spiritual experience", led to further festival appearances in the UK and in Spain, in addition to supporting artists such as Pram, Marsheaux, Death & Vanilla, Rowetta and Steve Davis. In 2020, he also performed as part of Damo Suzuki's band.
The 'Memory Box' EP is out now digitally via Happy Robots Records with distribution by Cargo Records. In mid-December, Cromwell also released 'Get Me To Prague' on 7" vinyl, which sold out in just a day. Find both of these releases on Spotify, Apple Music or obtain them directly from the artist via Bandcamp.
MEMORY BOX CREDITS
Written and recorded by Adam Cresswell
Martin J Langthorne - guitar on 'Memory Box'
Mixed and co-produced by Richard Bennett at Acme Hall Studios, New York
Mastered by Pete Maher
Album artwork by Martin J Langthorne
Remixes by Mood Taeg and AUW
Released via Happy Robots Records
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