Purling Hiss Line Up New Album for Drag City

BY Gregory AdamsPublished Dec 28, 2012

Since 2009, Philly psych-garage players Purling Hiss have offered up a stream of lo-fi efforts recorded in vocalist/guitarist Mike Polizze's home studio. While still apparently homing in on fuzzed-out soundscapes, the band's next LP, Water on Mars, will add a smidgen of studio sheen to their sound.

The nine-song LP is the first full-length outing to have been recorded in a commercial studio and is also the act's first outing for Drag City. The esteemed imprint will deliver the set March 19.

While a press release promises that the album features the group's "usual patches of distortion, singing melodies and unexpected production hoohah," it also states that the saturated guitar tones "work alongside of the rhythm section rather than avalanching it."

Sound samples have yet to arrive, but the press sheet points to the slide guitar- and piano-assisted "She Calms Me Down," the "wailing" title track, and the acoustic-driven "Dead Again" as a few key tracks.

While Purling Hiss dropped both their Hissteria and Public Service Announcement LPs in 2010, the band's last release was this year's A Little Off-Center: Live at WFMU cassette.

Water on Mars:

1. Lolita
2. Mercury Retrograde
3. Rat Race
4. Dead Again
5. She Calms Me Down
6. Face Down
7. The Harrowing Wind
8. Water on Mars
9. Mary Bumble Bee

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