Science Mixed with History: Emperor Yes

Posted on 9 October 2014
By Faye Smith
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Emperor Yes is the vision of the word ‘collaboration’. The three-piece is a musical ensemble which consists of a producer, a band member (of a different band) and a solo artist. Ash Gardner, Adam Betts and Hugo Sheppard are excellent visionaries of the indie-pop world with which they want to develop and expand through their music and art.

In the past, the “nerdy-pop” group have hosted a gallery show which lasted a month to celebrate their first release of Fishes/Wasps. The gallery held pop art images created by graffiti artists. Each image was based on a specific track by Emperor Yes to create an outstanding vision of the new music that they had created for their audience. Instead of having to imagine the words and melodies, members of the public could actually see it with their own eyes. Live performances were also held by Olubenga (Metronomy) alongside limited edition prints, press shots and music videos created by various artists in the art and music industry.

This small piece of history alone should prepare you for the release of Emperor Yes’s debut album and LP, An Island Called Earth, produced by Jeremy Warmsley of Summer Camp. This band doesn’t just go half the mile; they go out of this world. Literally. Each of the limited edition vinyls is named the ‘Cosmic’ Vinyl. First of all, the colour is not boring-basic-black, but green, white and orange. Most importantly though, each vinyl is infused with a tiny piece of outer space, that is, ground down dust of an earth-bound meteorite that crashed into planet Earth in the sixteenth century. Perfect for a band who love to sing about science and history. Almost destiny if you believe in that sort of thing.

Ash Gardner explains why this needed to happen: “People like to say, always sing about what you know. So we sing about science and history. They also say, put in your vinyl what you love to most. So we put a piece of outer space that collided with earth in the 16th century. Science and history.”

An Island Called Earth has track titles like ‘Cosmic Cat’, ‘Astronaut’, ‘Intergalactic Quarantine’ and ‘Carl Sagan’. It is obvious that the galaxy – not the chocolate kind – is at the forefront of this threesome’s mind. This is reflected in the futuristic synths and experimental electronics they use alongside their sometimes distorted voices. However, the band brings it back down to earth with the topics of nature in other song titles such as ‘Wasps’ and ‘Fishes’.

Fun, futuristic and imaginative are three things that the indie pop world needed. Now they’ve got it in the form of Emperor Yes.

Alcopop! Records will release An Island Called Earth on album and LP – including the limited edition ‘Cosmic’ Vinyl – on October 13th.

Pre-order now at http://awesomedistro.com/alcopop/

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