2024 marks 40 years of Pete Astor making records, a suitable anniversary point at which to take stock and double back on songs that first appeared on records by Astor-fronted combos such as Creation Records trailblazers The Loft and The Weather Prophets and Matador recording artists The Wisdom of Harry, as well as selections from solo albums that appeared on labels such as Danceteria and Static Caravan.
Astor’s motivation for Tall Stories & New Religions, his new album, which will be out on Tapete Records March 15th, 2024, is manifold: some songs are effectively re-examined in the way one might linger over a resonant picture from a box of old photographs -connecting with the essence of a younger self-, other songs are newly recast in wiser and more reflective hues, while others simply demanded exhumation from wilfully opaque, lo fi non- production.
The songs chosen are not the obvious ones – there’s no Up the Hill and Down the Slope or Almost Prayed here – but have been selected for more interesting, often esoteric, reasons.