Name: Expect The Best
Brand: Widowspeak

Bonus disc

Bonus disc: No

Catalogue number

CT266CD

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Colour

Colour details

Discogs ID

Format multiplier

Download code

Download code: No

Rough Trade Exclusive

Rough Trade Exclusive: No

Extended format

Extended format: No

Format detail

Format Music US

Limited edition

Release date

2017-08-25

Signed copies

Signed copies: No

Supplier US

Secre­tly

Tax rate US

Sales:8.875

UPC / Barcode

817949013509

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Total Cap

1 / CD / Extended format: No / Rough Trade Exclusive: No / Signed copies: No

CT266LP

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Black Vinyl w/Download

{"blocks": [{"data": {"text": "Black Vinyl w/Download"}, "type": "paragraph"}]}

817949013493

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1 / Extended format: No / LP / Rough Trade Exclusive: No / Signed copies: No

Artist

Widowspeak

Genre US

Indie Pop / Shoegaze

Label US

Captured Tracks

Beginning in a Brooklyn basement in 2008, Captured Tracks has gone on to change the face of music across America. One of the most prolific and consistent independent labels has produced huge artists from <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/mac-demarco">Mac DeMarco</a> to <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/diiv">DIIV</a> to <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/wild-nothing">Wild Nothing</a> alongside other acts like <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/perfect-pussy">Perfect Pussy</a>, <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/eztv">EZTV</a>, <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/reptaliens">Reptaliens</a> and <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/mourn">Mourn</a> whilst reissuing influential British artists like <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/monochrome-set">The Monochrome Set</a> and <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/artist/cleaners-from-venus">Cleaners From Venus</a>. The bands may differ but they share a pop sensibility - even if it is clouded by the influences they bear - that can only be the result of label boss Mike Sniper's taste for it.

Previous to Captured Tracks, Sniper ran a power pop label. You can never accuse Widowspeak or Beach Fossils of being power pop, but they are not adverse to an infectious hook or a clean, sweet sound. The <a href="https://roughtrade.com/us/music/b-boys-live-at-rough-trade">B Boys</a> certainly know how to turn on the pop with last year's fantastic album Dada, full to the brim with color and energy.

But Sniper wants a broad church. Grunge revisionist, Chastity is a perfect example - as well as Gift Wrap, Wax Chattels and Matteo Vallicelli. Captured Tracks is no sub-genre label, it is the fruit of the passion and perseverance of a global collective of music lovers.

Happy 10 year anniversary - How have you been celebrating this significant occasion? On a beach in Tahiti, visiting all the sites that inspired Gauguin, sipping on tropical drinks and eating extremely fresh seafood. Not really, actually I do not know if I've celebrated at all. I'm a bad celebrator. Can you describe the music scene in Brooklyn in 2008? How has it changed since then? The year 2008 was pretty pivotal. It was at the nadir of the "Loft Pop" DiY scene (Crystal Stilts, Vivian Girls, caUSE co-MOTION!, Woods, et al.). Todd P. was booking Market Hotel, 285 Kent might have been around then, Glasslands, Monster Island and all those other spaces were there. Out of town bands like The Oh Sees, Grass Widow, Abe Vigoda would draw really well and everyone from the above bands and scenes would be there. Simultaneously, the Wierd Records scene was also going nuts and you had Martial Canterel, Led Er Est and touring acts like Nite Jewel would draw heavy at that. Blank Dogs, my band, was kinda straddling both of those scenes. It was just super active and successful, no one was the top dog, it was all very much "all in it together." Everyone was supportive and bought each other's records, supported each other at shows and places like Pitchfork and Fader actually gave a shit. Can you imagine?! So, yeah, we came out of that as a label, just behind Woodsist and Sacred Bones. Being an artist yourself, did that shape how you ran the label? Did it shape who you signed? Sure, I mean, I think less about myself being in bands and more about understanding the distribution, touring and press circuits before I started. It certainly helped I was friends with John Dwyer, Jeremy Earl, etc., so I could put their records out right from the get go, sorta fly-by-night handshake deals, nothing serious. I only started to really sign bands in 2009, that's when I signed Wild Nothing and Beach Fossils. I definitely wanted bands to arrive to me with their sound down pat, ready to work hard and an understanding of their audience and their aesthetic, still do! For those new to the label, could you give 5 records that have helped define Captured Tracks? Hard one, but I think you have to put Wild Nothing Nocturne, DIIV Oshin, Beach Fossils Beach Fossils and Mac DeMarco Salad Days on there. After that it's pretty hard. The Soft Moon's debut, Widowspeak's debut, Craft Spells Idle Labor, the Perfect Pussy record... man, I dunno if I could pick a 5th and final. With a roster like yours (Wild Nothing, The Soft Moon, Beach Fossils, Mac DeMarco, DIIV, Craft Spells, B Boys, Molly Burch), what is one of your most memorable artist discovery moments? Wax Chattels live in Auckland, NZ. Signed them (in all but paperwork) the next day at brunch. It was that fast. If you see them live you'll see why. Re-issues are a core aspect of Captured Tracks - how do you decide on the records you re-introduce us listeners to? I try to reissue stuff that is really in need of a reissue as it is unavailable on a lot of formats, but also fits into the culture of the label. Older music and newer music living together. Sometimes it's something like Luna which has this large built-in audience, and other times it's Saada Bonaire or Bona Dish, which has a cult following that I feel our audience would respond to and enjoy. You’ve been a label for ten years now, what is one goal you have for the next ten years? Exist. Not be crushed by the horrible world.

Label Focus - Captured Tracks

Widowspeak is an indie rock band hailing from Brooklyn, New York, USA. Known for their dream-pop and shoegaze sound, the band consists of *Molly Hamilton* on vocals and *Robert Earl Thomas* on guitar. With influences ranging from Blouse to Real Estate, Widowspeak has carved out a unique place in the music scene. Their captivating melodies and ethereal vocals have garnered them a dedicated following. Explore their mesmerizing tunes and get lost in the enchanting world of Widowspeak.

Formed in Brooklyn, Widowspeak has become synonymous with the indie rock genre. Led by the hauntingly beautiful vocals of *Molly Hamilton*, their music effortlessly blends elements of dream-pop and shoegaze. Alongside her is *Robert Earl Thomas*, whose skillful guitar playing adds depth to each track. Drawing inspiration from artists like Pure X and Warpaint, Widowspeak's sound is both nostalgic and contemporary.

If you're a fan of bands such as Lower Dens or Wild Nothing, then Widowspeak should be on your radar. Their atmospheric soundscapes transport listeners to another realm while maintaining a grounded authenticity. From their debut album "Widowspeak" to later releases like "Expect The Best," each record showcases their growth as musicians.

Widowspeak remain purveyors of mood. Whether painting an image of a basement apartment with blinds closed or conjuring the sweeping openness of a desert, they’re an outfit ever preoccupied with the influence of place and the passage of time on personal experience: the way vivid memories can feel like movies or dreams. On their newest album for Brooklyn’s Captured Tracks, Widowspeak use familiar aesthetics as a narrative device, a purposeful nostalgic backdrop for songs that ask, “How did we get here?” Sonically, they exist somewhere in the overlap between somber indie rock, dream pop, slow-core and their own invented genre, "cowboy grunge." At the heart of the band, there is a palpable duality, a push and pull between the delicate and the deliberate: the contrast of lead singer-songwriter Molly Hamilton’s strikingly beautiful voice and poignant melodies with the terrestrial reality of being a four-piece rock band. These songs sound like the dark bars and rock clubs they were imagined for just as much as the bedrooms where they were written. Expect the Best sees Widowspeak finding their greatest balance between opposing forces: darkness and light, quiet and loud, tension and calm. The album was written while Hamilton was living in Tacoma, Washington after previous stints in upstate New York and Brooklyn. Although Widowspeak’s last two records - Almanac (2013) and All Yours (2015) - were conceived as a duo with lead guitarist Robert Earl Thomas, Expect the Best finds them playing to the specific strengths of the current touring incarnation (James Jano on drums, Willy Muse on bass). The album, recorded by Kevin MacMahon (Swans, Real Estate), exhibits a marked increase in energy that reflects the band’s live show and the organic way it was created: by four people in a room together. The band collectively navigate dynamic changes with subtlety and restraint; the nine tracks here reach highs of wide-eyed lushness and plumb the depths of resigned melancholy. Their usual palette of dusty guitars and angular twang are still here front and center, but now with a bit more 90s homage, even if abstractly. The Pacific Northwest influences creep in throughout, as do varying flavors of New York's legacy, the city the band still partially calls home. It’s their heaviest record to date, but never loses the sense of quiet intimacy that Widowspeak is known for.