During their recent debut North American tour, cryptically-named duo JOHN – comprised of John Newton (drums, lead vocals) and Johnny Healey (guitar, backing vocals) – stopped by Audiotree Studios in Chicago, IL, to lay down a furious session and to chat about their recently released fourth album, A Life Diagrammatic, which is out now via Brace Yourself and Pets Care Records.
The session features A Life Diagrammatic staples ‘At Peacehaven’, ‘Côte D’Adur’, ‘Trauma Mosaic’ and ‘Riddley Scott Walker’ as well as ‘Theme New Bond Junior’ from a standalone 7″ released early in 2023 that catapulted the band to #1 on the UK vinyl singles chart. Check out the session in full below.
Having already taken A Life Diagrammatic on tour across North America last autumn and undertaken the first leg of a UK tour through the end of 2023, JOHN return to the UK circuit next month for the second half of their bumper national run. The shows kick off on Feb 9th at Bournemouth’s Bear Cave, take in their biggest London headline show to date at Scala on Feb 29th, and culminate in a March 9th knees-up at Newcastle’s Cluny 2.
A Life Diagrammatic was recorded by Tom Hill at The Bookhouse in South London, mixed by Seth Manchester (METZ, Big Brave, Battles) and mastered by Frank Arkwright (Arab Strap, Squarepusher, Autechre) with the aim of merging the powerful live presence of the band whilst also honing in on some of the more varied dynamics at play. “We wanted to further explore the space and ambience of our instrumentation,” says Newton. “To offer an album that deliberately pushes and pulls in a multitude of directions throughout its duration.”
The album was trailed by the singles ‘Riddley Scott Walker’ (ft. former Bad Seed and Magazine man Barry Adamson), ‘The Common Cold’, ‘Service Stationed’ and ‘Trauma Mosaic’.
