It comes as no surprise that GROW GROW is teasing their new album “Lichterlohโ, which will be out on September 21st, with the video release of a song about vampires โ creatures between life and death, undead, yet not vital, “visibleโ only at night, still present without wanting to be, stuck inbetween two worlds, with limited death options, dangerous, scary, but scared themselves (light, garlic, stakes, stab to the heart), post-human, pale and lonely.
“Wir waren Vampireโ (“We Were Vampiresโ) catches the spirit of the new album quite well, as “Lichterlohโ (“Ablazeโ) deals with the darker and more sinister elements and subjects of human existence, reflecting and processing punches of fate that hit the band’s songwriter in the course of the making of the record. The anger, pain, sadness and vertigo of irreversibly losing precious ones was the fuel for the songwriting process and adds melancholy as well as fury to the seven new songs of the noisey Post-HC trio from Berlin, Germany, lyrically and musically.
GROW GROW was already founded in 2009 with their bassist Patrick Finke being the only remaining founding member of the former 4-piece formation. What began as a classic noise-rock band with a harsh and dominant aluminium bass, single-note guitars, mathy drums, odd-numbered beats and English lyrics, paying soundwise tribute to bands like Shellac, Melvins or the Jesus Lizzard, has become something different after several line-up changes.
Especially after splitting-up with their first vocalist during the recording of their first full length release โBuffet d’Orโ in 2016/2017 and shrinking to a trio by having guitarist Martin Thiele finish the vocals in German and – for the sake of simplicity – remained to be vocalist from then on, GROW GROW’s sound and style has changed a lot.
Single-tone guitars were replaced by real chords, riff-based song fractures by structured songs, cryptic English lyrics by concrete and sometimes political German lyrics, oddnumbered hick-up beats by mostly straight-forward drumming, etc., expressing GROW GROW’s already existing admiration and worship of in your face, dirty 90-ies Dischord Post-Punk and Post- HC bands, with Fugazi to name as probably the biggest influence and root of it all.
Back then GROW GROW simply forgot to change their bandname in order to make that change obvious and clear to the outside world. But somehow GROW GROW liked the fact that the simple continuity of the bandname led to confusion due to the contrasting change in their sound. In 2019 their second album โAm kalten Marktโ followed, with which GROW GROW established and developped their own sound of noisey Post-HC.
One line-up change on the drums (welcoming Karl Bernhard Elsner on board), half a pandemic and a cancelled tour later, GROW GROW are about to release their third full length album “Lichterlohโ on September 21st of 2021, which you are reading about just right now. It contains seven songs with a playtime of approximately 35 minutes. Besides said song(s) about loss, GROW GROW is dealing with different other subjects such as obedience, childhood memories, inner demons, climate change, escape and – back to start: vampires.
“The motivation to write and record our new album โLichterlohโ was as unfortunate as it was urgent and neccessary.” – says the band.
“It is not required to give any more personal details here, as the album is explicit enough to get a notion of real events it reflects upon, if one wants to listen. At the same time it is subtle enough to not get overwhelmed by some stranger’s personal issues – besides, lyrics are in German so it will be gibberish to anyone listening to it from outside German speaking countries anyway, haha.”
๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ก๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ข๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ข๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ฆ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ข๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ก๐ ๐๐๐.
Continues the band’s lyricist Martin Thiele: “Whenever I read or listened to interviews of musicians in the past, speaking of music as a therapeutical tool to deal with blows of fate, it always seemed to much of a cliche to me to be true; until I found myself in a similar situation and realised that it actually is true.”
๐บ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐กโ๐๐๐ ๐กโ๐๐ก ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ก๐๐ข๐๐ก๐๐ฃ๐๐๐ฆ ๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ข๐๐ ๐๐ค๐๐ฆ, ๐๐ ๐กโ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ฃ๐๐ ๐๐๐กโ๐๐๐ ๐๐ข๐ก ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ข๐โ ๐๐ ๐ โ๐๐๐๐๐ฃ๐๐, ๐๐ฃ๐๐ ๐กโ๐๐ข๐โ ๐ ๐ข๐โ โ๐๐๐๐๐ก๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ก ๐๐ ๐กโ๐๐ฆ ๐๐๐ ๐ ๐ข๐๐๐๐๐๐ข๐๐ข๐ ๐๐๐ ๐กโ๐ ๐ก๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐.
“Also, it feels disappointing and hard to realise, that grief cannot even be composed, feedbacked, shredded or screamed away, but at least by doing so you learn to struggle with yourself and most important: in the end something remains after recording it.
At best, this remaining something documents and mirrors your struggle, when you are getting back to it in the future. At best, this remaining something allows you to address it to others in a way that conversational language is destined to fail. At best, this remaining something touches hearts or minds of others and reminds them of something they had to go through. At best, we feel less alone, solely by being connected through these documented but etheral soundwaves, which by definition is nothing less than magic.
Fate and the events it creates have become a part of my life as it is a part of anybody else’s life in every possible individual way. Expressing it with words and music has helped me to accept the fact that it is, what it is: a part of me. Hope is the ghostnote of despair, confidence is an overtone of a sad minor chord, light can only exist where there is dark.”
“It’s all hidden in soundwaves. Just listen!” – he concludes.
Finally, GROW GROW would like to give a shout-out and ask you to pay some well-deserved attention to musicians and bands they are friends with and whose musical works are an inspiration for them.
“Please do not expect them to sound anything like us or a certain style/genre we might be described with” – they say. “… but be sure that all of them do what they do, the way they do 100 % in their own sincere, true, honest, compassionate and independent DIY way, which is by far more important than any genre affiliation”
erai:
We share one guitarist and good memories of touring together. Great emotive HC!
Lesions Grave
Arty, skilled, experimental, instrumental, deconstructive black metal, featuring Henner on the drums, who recorded our last two albums at Tonmeisterei, Oldenburg. Unbelievably good!
Leaf Kickers
Free-jazzy, experimental noiseey, no-wave guitar/drums duo and good friends we often shared stages with in the past. If anyone has doubts: yes, this is AUDIBLE and really good!
Unbite
Superb noise rock. Their last album โFangโ has been released on the Polish label Antena Krzyku. We made friends with them via social media during the pandemic and canโt wait to play shows together as soon as this will be possible again. Highly recommendable!
Mรถrtel Sounds – tape label
Check out the whole catalogue from Jelgerโs exquisite tape label who is kind enough to release a small tape edition of our latest record โLichterlohโ. Mรถrtel Sounds has released some fine tapes of great bands such as the remarkable Fluid to Gas as well as the unique AACKR.
