Category Archives: News

News

Upcoming release and performance

This is Ryan again with a little update of what’s going on with us. Our first new music to be released in over a year and a half will be the cd-single Sideways Forest. It is a three songs disc: “Sideways Forest” (the mix that will be on our new album), a trippy groovy remix/re-worked mix of “Sideways Forest” and “Amarillo” — which will not be on the new album. This is set to come out in late June or early July. Our new full length album (still not titled) will follow in September.

We are looking forward to our next live performance at the Projekt Festival at which we’ll be playing two or three new songs in our still all-acoustic set. This will be our first show in Chicago, which was skipped between our West Coast and East Coast tours last year. It should be a lot of fun and please come see us (along with Lycia, lovesliescrushing, and Thanatos on our night) if you are from the area, since we have no plans to be playing there again anytime soon.

Also, if anybody read the Projekt news on the Projekt web, Sam commented on how he thought I wanted to move to Mexico City, as a few people have asked me about. No, I do not want to move there (and no, we were not treated like big rock stars as Sam described). I did say to him that I would like to make more visits there, in the spirit of my Beat heroes like Kerouac, which I plan to do this summer after the Chicago show for a few weeks and visit friends and eat non-stop.

News

Hello!

Hello. This is Ryan of Love Spirals Downwards. This is the first band info message from us on our webpage. I plan to update this every 2 or 3 months, or whenever there’s new information.

We’ve had lots of things happening with us lately including a show in Mexico City at the very beautiful Museo Universitario del Chopo on February 29. We spent a wonderful week in Mexico making many new friends and seeing some truly fantastic sights such as the pyramids at Teotihuacan (we climbed to the top of the Pyramid of the Sun), as well as eating some of the best food in our lives.

We haven’t even begun to think about new tours yet but some shows may happen later this year. One upcoming scheduled performance is the Projekt Festival in Chicago. It is a two-evening event that will include nearly all of Projekt’s current recording line-up. We will supposedly be closing the first night on June 25. For more information on this call the Projekt info-line at (312) 491-0108.

Review

The First Pain to Linger Review

Audio Drudge # 7, Issue 7

With this 34-minute-maxi-CD and 92-page book, Sam Rosenthal simultaneously reveals the roots of Black Tape for A Blue Girl’s last album This Lush Garden Within, and brings this period of his art to a close. The book tells the story of how Sam opened himself to loving Susan, who inspired This Lush Garden Within. Consisting of seven tracks, two previously unreleased and five from various compilations, the disc is a nice introduction for those unfamiliar with BTFBG, and a must for die-hard fans. All the tracks occupy the warm ethereal ambient realm Projekt has almost single-handedly defined; synth washes and gently strummed guitars combine with floating female vocals to produce a sensation of being suspended in a nurturing ocean of sound. I was especially charmed by the shiny, ringing wine-glass like synth and guitar of “the glass is shattered,” in whose somberly contemplative tone I saw portrayed a man sitting alone at a kitchen table bathed in afternoon sunlight, staring at a broken glass occupying an empty place at the table, wondering: “the glass is shattered / is that what makes it beautiful?” The ebbing and flowing guitar (guested by Ryan Lum of Love Spirals Downwards) and dancing lights in fog evoked by the keyboards made “overwhelmed, beneath me” a standout track as well. And the menacing synth foundations of the closing, unnamed track support glittering undersea castles of sound, which build, shimmer, then swirl away in the dark currents. Although I enjoyed almost all of the tracks, I found the lack of continuity between them disturbing, even though I knew this was a compilation LP and I shouldn’t expect continuity. Still, this is a good place to start for those curious about BTFBG, and a welcome appetizer for their next full length album, due out in May.

Interview

Mean Streets Vol. 8, #4 (1996) [Scan, Transcript & Audio]

Article by Ned Raggett

For Ryan Lum, instrumentalist for the L.A. based duo, Love Spirals Downwards, sticking to just one means of musical expression is not an option.

“I go between making this pure acoustic music and then going into this analog synthesizer, drum machine sound, tweaking knobs and stuff — just to keep things fun! If I did the same thing for a while, I’d get burnt out!”

Combined with the truly beautiful vocals of Suzanne Perry, Lum’s work in Love Spirals Downwards is a lush, wondrous experience. The band’s third album, Ever, has just been released on Projekt, and clearly demonstrates that Lum and Perry have moved from being simply fine disciples of the Cocteau Twins school of performance to becoming distinctly intriguing artists in their own right.

For Lum, the question of influence is a tricky one, reflecting the tension between inspiration and the need to be one’s own person.

“It’s hard to say which bands listen to are my influences and which are not. I guess everything I listen to somehow gets mixed up in what I do. That’s a tough question, because I don’t know what I’m trying to get away from, or what I’m trying to be like.”

Continue reading Mean Streets Vol. 8, #4 (1996) [Scan, Transcript & Audio] →
Interview

Interview in Black Moon

Love Spirals Downwards is Ryan Lum and Suzanne Perry. They are one of the bands in the line up at the Projekt Festival. They will be hitting the ethereal air waves with their unique guitar and keyboards. This is one of the bands that I can’t wait to see at the festival. – Lou

Interview by Armand Rosamilia

BLACK MOON: How is your relationship with Projekt Records and Sam Rosenthal?

RL: It’s been pretty good. We get along good.

SP: I think they’re good to us. The royalties are really good. They do a good job of promotion. We’ve been able to be friends with them too.

RL: As opposed to purely business associates.

SP: Obviously, some things are all business. They don’t just think about sales.

RL: Given that fact of life, Projekt is good to us.

SP: They’re artists too.

Continue reading Interview in Black Moon →
Interview

El Nacional Interview

The band had a half page interview in the major national newspaper, El Nacional, for Thurs, February 29, 1996. Following is an English translation, followed by the actual article.

LOVE SPIRALS DOWNWARDS: Music for the End of the Millennium

By XAVIER QUIRARTE

Suzanne Perry and Ryan Lum are in the music scene to enjoy the freedom of creating sounds, and they delegate the pursuit of their art to no one but themselves. Love Spirals Downwards, the creative duo that started on the principle of minimal commitment, has crystallized into two discs. Idylls and Ardor, edited by the independent US label Project, are proof of this. “Music for the end of the millennium,” dark gothic, “ethereal sounds” or “angelical,” are some of the adjectives that their work has earned.

Continue reading El Nacional Interview →
Interview, News

The News, Vol XLVI NO. 232, Feb 29. 1996

U.S. Avante Garde Duo To Play D.F.

By Jose Fernandez Ramos, The News Staff Reporter

Love Spirals Downwards is one of those alternative bands whose music tends to attract a cult following.

What has happened to this Los Angeles duo, featuring Suzanne Perry (vocals) and Ryan Lum (guitars, electronics), is interesting and sometimes funny.

“One time a magazine wanted to interview us because they thought we had a lot to say about LSD due to our band’s name. But when they learned we’d never tried it, they lost interest,” Perry claimed.

Although many fans attribute the duo’s music with spiritual, mystic and even healing powers, and critics have labelled their work with adjectives as diverse as “dark ethereal,” “gothic,””dream pop,” “angelic,” “Avant Garde,” “ambient,” etc., this young duo put things very simply.

“We just compose music without any specific intention,”Lum says.

Continue reading The News, Vol XLVI NO. 232, Feb 29. 1996 →
News

Band news

We’ve had lots of things happening lately including a couple of shows in Mexico City and Guadalajara. And there is a new, still untitled, album that we are almost finished recording and mixing. It should have 10 new tracks and we hope to have it released in May or June depending on how soon we finish, as well as other record label factors. Also, we will most likely be contributing new songs to Hyperium Records’ upcoming compilations Heavenly Voices 4 and Heavenly Grooves.

We haven’t even begun to think about new tours yet, but some shows may happen later this year. One show that we are scheduled to perform is at the Projekt Records festival in Chicago. It is a two evening event that will include nearly all of Projekt’s current recording line-up. We will be closing the first night on June 25.

For more information on this, call the Projekt info-line at (312) 491-0108 or check out http://charlotte.acns.nwu.edu/arielr/projekt on the internet (the current site, but soon to be moving Projekt web site).

(taken from the band’s official mail list)

News

News Update

Sorry it’s been awhile since our last update. We’ve been very busy with many different things, one of which was our short ‘tour’. After a show in Seattle last Spring, we did a 3-show tour in August and September of Boston, Philadelphia, and New York, followed by a show in Los Angeles. Many thanks to Pat Ogle at Projekt for making that happen! Being a studio-band and not having played live before, much to our surprise we had a great time doing these shows. It was especially nice to be able to meet some of you who write us! We hope to do more next year. And, we are tentatively set for doing one last show this year in Los Angeles again at the Troubadour on December 16.

Also, we are in the middle of recording and mixing a new album (still untitled), which will hopefully be released in the Spring of ’96 depending on when we finish. In the meantime, we released a new track, a cover of ‘Welcome Christmas from Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas. on the new Projekt holiday CD called Excelsis.

‘Excelsis: A dark noel’ various artist compilation on Projekt Records

I also wanted to let you know that there’s a decent mailing list called ‘4AD-L’. In addition to bands on its namesake 4AD, other related music such as ourselves and a few other Projekt artists are often discussed and reviewed. To subscribe, send email to 4ad-l@listserv.american.edu, and type “subscribe 4AD-L” . We will try to post new information regarding our shows and releases in their News section.

(taken from the band’s official mail list)

Interview

Big O Interview

Projekt sent over a press clipping of our interview. It reads:

LOVE SPIRAL DOWNWARDS

“Reaching into the heart of the matter” by Zulkifli Othman

Love Spiral Downwards are just one of those bands that make music that transcends, well, music. Like Dead Can Dance or the Cocteau Twins, their sound reaches inside human feelings, a sound that has become a trademark for all bands on the Projekt label. The American duo of Suzanne Perry and Ryas Lum create a sincere innovation in lush and expressive visions. What follows was due to be a straight question and answer format, but it was anything but a simple yes-and-no affair.

Zulkifli Othman: Is there another aspect of the band we should know, because your music is a stimulation of feelings? The ultimate mood music, if you will.

Ryan Lum: Well, I don’t know about the “ultimate” mood music, but yes, I see our music as a kind of music that stimulates feelings and is often moody.  What I think is unique about our music is that we give it a direction to which the listener is very free to take it where they are led by their own mind.  It’s kind of an escapist thing.

Continue reading Big O Interview →