Gnoomes / Dearthworms / Kalter

REDUNDANT SPAN PRESENTS... GNOOMES (Rocket Recordings)

Rescheduled from 2023!

Hailing from Perm, Russia, GNOOMES blend a potent mix of psychedelic stargaze, kraut techno and kosmische pop, and are touring in support of their album, Ax Ox.

Originally a four-piece, GNOOMES are currently touring as a duo - Sasha and Masha Piankova - and this will be the band's first Sheffield appearance.

Support comes from Dearthworms and Kalter.

“Gnoomes create seriously delirious and transportive sounds.” - Clash

“Stunning stuff from this Russian psych-rock outfit.” - The Quietus

“Glorious songs.” – NME

“An epic take on shoegazing.” – Dazed

“Re-assessing and extrapolating sonic boundaries.” - Loud and Quiet

As musicians across the world have watched the last decade systematically eating away at the infrastructure by which they pursue their art, triumphs against adversity have sometimes entered the realm of cliche . Yet few bands have undergone quite the travails that Perm, Russia’s Gnoomes have on the road to the release of their fourth release on Rocket Recordings, Ax Ox.

From such traumatic circumstances, with the band having overcome the stress of a pandemic, illness, depression and serious turmoil in their home country to reach a point where they can offer their music to the world, have arrived a kaleidoscopic and questing vision shot through with potent melancholia and strident optimism.

As with many other Russian artists and musicians, Sasha and his wife Masha Piankova have both been forced to leave the country when mobilisation was announced in pursuit of safety, but this album still bears the hallmarks of an album influenced by the very specific experience of living in Russia in the last three decades.

“In our opinion this album could be a psychedelic musical about growing up and living in the Post Soviet Russia” relates Sasha “If you watched (Adam Curtis’ documentary series) Traumazone, it’s not complicated really to imagine the visual part of the musical!'

Ax Ox ultimately reflects something of an odyssey for a complex and inhospitable modern era, and perhaps the centrepiece of the record - the moment which most sums up the continuum reflected in its heartfelt yet pragmatic nature - is the uplifting kosmische travelogue of ‘Eternal Trans Siberian’.

As Sasha points out, this has become “some sort of manifesto, pretty much inspired by Stereolab. It’s a metaphor of what’s going on to our country. It feels like we’re traveling on a rusty and wrecked train through space and time. The epochs change, but the problems stay the same and we don’t know how it’s possible, but the train is still moving”.