ROLLING BLACKOUTS COASTAL FEVER NEW ALBUM SIDEWAYS TO NEW ITALY – OUT TODAY!

“Our new album Sideways to New Italy is out today. It feels strange releasing music with so much happening in the world right now, but we couldn’t be more proud and excited. This is a hopeful record, true to the people and places that shaped us. We hope you get something out of it too. There are too many people who helped us to list here. We can’t wait to play these songs live in the new world. Look after each other and play it loud.” 
Love, Joe, Joe, Fran, Marcel, Tom.
Rolling Blackouts C.F.

Today Ivy League Records are thrilled to release Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever’s triumphant second album, Sideways to New Italy – a stunning return for the Melbourne five-piece. Featuring tracks ‘She’s There’, ‘Cars In Space’, ‘Falling Thunder’ & the anthemic, ‘Cameo’ – Sideways To New Italy shows Rolling Blackouts C.F. at the peak of their powers; a timeless record that’s universal yet threaded through with personal histories, born of dislocation but with a distinct geographic identity.

To coincide with the album release is the announcement of new single ‘Cameo’, which begins with open guitar strums and Fran Keaney’s lone voice, before building to a swirling roar – a stellar showcase of the band’s instrumental and lyrical prowess.

“This is a love song. It’s about reaching through time portals,” says Keaney. “The lyrics were pieced together over about a year like a little puzzle. I found the first pieces in Rushworth, and the last pieces in Darwin.”

Sideways to New Italy is set to follow in the footsteps of the band’s internationally acclaimed debut album, Hope Downs (2018), with praise for STNI coming in from MOJO (4/5), Dork (4/5), Upset (5/5), Uncut (9/10), Rough Trade’s ‘Album of the Month’, The Music’s Album Of The Week + more to be announced.

The eponymous New Italy is a village near New South Wales’s Northern Rivers – the area Tussie is from. A blink-and-you’ll-miss-it pit-stop of a place with fewer than 200 residents, it was founded by Venetian immigrants in the late-1800s and now serves as something of a living monument to Italians’ contribution to Australia, with replica Roman statues dotted like souvenirs on the otherwise rural landscape. The parallel between these remnants of home and the band’s own attempts to maintain connections and create familiarity during their disorienting time on the road were not lost on Russo. “These are the expressions of people trying to find home somewhere alien, in someone else’s land. Trying to create utopia in an imperfect world.”

In addition to the specific town, the songs on the record exist variably in Melbourne (‘Beautiful Steven’), Los Angeles (‘The Cool Change’), Darwin (‘Cameo’), the tiny town of Rushworth (‘Not Tonight’) and the driver’s seat of a car at a drive-in movie (‘Cars in Space’). Rolling Blackouts C.F are well-versed in a detailed and cinematic style of songwriting, where landscapes, interactions and memories materialise as characters and stories that reflect the tight, swirling guitars that emote alongside the trio’s voices.

A not-to-be-missed performance by Rolling Blackouts C.F. at the hallowed turf of the Melbourne Cricket Ground (aka MCG), with special guest Stella Donnelly, will air tonight as part of the final episode of The State of Music. Tune in from 7.30pm AEST HERE.

The brilliant Sideways To New Italy is out now on digital, CD & Sub Pop’s limited edition Loser blue vinyl. A second vinyl pressing in black is also available to fans to pre-order.