Mild High Club is the home for the musical output of Alexander Brettin, a jazz-schooled musician transplanted from the Midwest to Los Angeles. This Friday, The Club’s debut album Timeline comes out on Circle Star Records, a new imprint of Stones Throw Records, and fans can now hear the album in full ahead of its release here.
With influences ranging from the pure-pop of Todd Rundgren to the sixties psych scene, Mild High Club’s music favors phased melodies and heartfelt lyrics. SPIN call it “head-swayingly hypnotic” whileImpose Magazine proclaim his track “Undeniable” to be “one of your new favorite songs . . . here is the most chill and mild sounds imaginable.” Brettin began recording Timeline in 2012 with everything from a Fostex 4-track cassette recorder to a MacBook, 12-string electric guitar, PortaSound keyboard, bass drum machine and software, resulting in what Stereogum refer to as “a lost ‘60s tune, each note sustained with a twirl of vibrato creating an elongated nonchalant West Coast vibe . . . it’s sweet, in all senses of the word.”
For live performances, Brettin draws other members of the loose Mild High Club collective from all over the United States, for what Brettin calls “a vessel for our musical and comical curiosities.” Collaborators and loose Club members Ariel Pink and Weyes Blood feature on Mild High Club’s “The Chat,” while he has toured with compatriots like Mac DeMarco, Mikal Cronin, Ariel Pink, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, post punk pioneers Wire and more. Currently on a massive North American tour, Mild High Club will head to Europe next month as well as New York’s CMJ, with all dates below.
Timeline arrives September 18th on Circle Star Records, with pre-orders available via iTunes.
Timeline Tracklisting
(September 18th, 2015 | Circle Star Records)
1. Club Intro
2. Windowpane
3. Note To Self
4. You and Me
5. Undeniable
6. Timeline
7. Rollercoaster Baby
8. Elegy
9. Weeping Willow
10. The Chat (feat. Ariel Pink and Weyes Blood)
“Mild High’s melodies are refreshing in their simplicity, harkening back to the days when the studio was an instrument and songs topped out at three minutes. MHC’s chill, cerebral, and spaced out: the stoner-philosopher of 2015.” SPIN
“Lucid, lovely and weird . . . ‘Undeniable’ is built and on a warped and withered groove that ascends like ‘Come On Eileen’ then descends like a bad trip, but all with the an airy and effected vox hovering over the revery akin to Fab Four stylings, making for a very enjoyable (and fitting) score to your next hallucination.” Okayplayer
“Dilapidated retro sound brought to mind the eccentric breeziness of Mac DeMarco cut with the researched baroque-pop of Jacco Gardner.” Exclaim
“Like Ariel Pink, Brettin exists within a realm of hazy analog hiss where the melodies are strong and catchy, but the performances and arrangements remain unpredictable and otherworldly . . . an infectious slice of home-recorded charm and strangeness.” FLOOD Magazine
Mild High Club Tour Dates
Sep 14 – Philadelphia, PA – PhilaMOCA *
Sep 15 – Brooklyn, NY – Silent Barn *
Sep 16 – Boston, MA – Out of the Blue *
Sep 17 – Portland, ME – Empire *
Sep 18 – Burlington, VT – Monkey House
Sep 19 – Montreal, QC – Pop Montreal
Sep 20 – Guelph, ON – Army Navy Verterans Hall 344
Sep 21 – Hamilton, ON – Fort Elgin
Sep 22 – Toronto, ON – Smiling Buddha
Sep 23 – Pittsburgh, PA – Spirit Lodge
Sep 24 – Cleveland, OH – 17th Street Warehouse
Sep 25 – Detroit, MI – Elijah’s
Sep 26 – Bloomington, IN – Blockhouse
Sep 27 – Cincinnati, OH – Midpoint Music Fest
Sep 28 – Chicago, IL – The Owl
Sep 29 – Des Moines, IA – Vaudeville Mews
Sep 30 – Sioux Falls, SD – Total Drag
Oct 1 – Omaha, NE – Lokoout Lounge
Oct 2 – Denver, CO – Rhinoceropolis
Oct 3 – Colorado Springs, CO – Flux Capacitor
Oct 9 – Los Angeles, CA – HM157
Oct 21 – Birmingham, UK – Hare and Hounds
Oct 22 – Glasgow, UK – The Hug and Pint
Oct 23 – Manchester, UK – Gullivers
Oct 24 – Bristol, UK – Simple Things Festival
Oct 26 – London, UK – Old Blue Last
Oct 27 – Pitchfork Paris Opening Night – Paris, FR
Oct 28 – Antwerp, BE – Trix
Oct 29 – Amsterdam, NL – OT301 (Subbacultcha Night)
Oct 30 – Berlin, DE – ACUD
Oct 31 – Bandittown, CA – Vertigofest
* with Laser Background
