UK band bdrmm will release their third album, Microtonic, on February 28 via Mogwai’s Rock Action label; it follows last year’s I Don’t Know. They made it with longtime collaborator Alex Greaves and it features contributions from Sydney Minsky Sargeant of Working Men’s Club and Olivesque of Nightbus. The record also finds the band exploring further past the shoegaze sounds that originally inspired them. “I felt very constrained writing a certain type of music to fit the genre [we were known for] but something lifted and I felt more free to create what I want,” says the band’s Ryan Smith. “And what I seem to be doing at the moment is a lot of electronic music – taking influence from different spans of electronica, from dance music to ambient and more experimental sources.”
Shoegaze is definitely not the first word that comes to mind with new single “John on the Ceiling,” which is sleek, electronic and danceable, but also with hazy atmospheric touches. “The themes surrounding John on the Ceiling are that of confusion and doubt,” Smith says. “When something ends and another starts, you lure yourself into a false sense of security that the mistakes made won’t happen again. This happens over and over until you are paralysed in limbo. Can people ever truly change?” Listen below.
bdrmm will be on a UK/EU tour in March and those dates are listed below.
Microtonic
goit (ft. Sydney Minsky Sargent)
John On The Ceiling
Infinity Peaking
Snares
In The Electric Field (ft. Olivesque)
Microtonic
Clarkycat
Sat in the Heat
Lake Disappointment
The Noose
bdrmm – march 2025 tour
6 Wylam Brewery, Newcastle UK
7 The Welly, Hull UK
8 Project House, Leeds UK
9 Queen Margaret Union, Glasgow UK
11 Gorilla, Manchester UK
12 Rescue Rooms, Nottingham UK
13 The Castle & Falcon, Birmingham UK
15 Hove Old Market, Brighton UK
16 Papillon, Southampton UK
18 The Fleece, Bristol UK
19 Electric Ballroom, London UK
22 Club Volta, Cologne GE
23 Säälchen, Berlin GE
25 Bogen F, Zurich SWI
26 Santeria Toscana 31, Milan IT
27 TPO, Bologna IT
29 Trabeno, Paris FR
30 Botanique – Orangerie, Brussels BE
31 Melkweg OZ, Amsterdam NL