'Station Europa' is the third and final single to be lifted from 10 000 Russos forthcoming album, stream it below
Portuguese experimental trio 10 000 Russos are today sharing ‘Station Europa’, the third and final single to be lifted from their forthcoming ‘Superinertia’ LP ahead of its releases on September 10th via Fuzz Club. In support of the new album, which will be their fifth LP to date, 10 000 Russos will be touring across the UK and Europe this Autumn. Arriving off the back recent singles ‘Super Inertia’ and ‘A House Full of Garbage’, you can stream ‘Station Europa’ below and pre-order the new album on vinyl here.
Following on from 2019’s ‘Kompromat’ LP and tour-dates around the UK, Europe and Mexico in support, the Porto-based band describe ‘Superinertia’ as a record addressing the “state of inertia that humans live in the West nowadays. It isn’t a record about the past or future. It’s about now.” The inertia of the album’s title, they say, is one deeply-rooted in the Western condition – in which ‘common sense’ masquerades political impotence, culture is largely dominated by pastiche and nostalgia and life itself is reduced to an endless cycle of work-consume-repeat. Although, for all that ‘Superinertia’ might take aim at a world without motion, the same cannot be said of 10 000 Russos, whose music has always been about as kinetic as it gets.
Across their previous releases the band have ploughed a driving motorik sound that has often drawn comparisons to the likes of Neu!, The Fall and Spacemen 3. On this new album, however, the addition of synth player Nils Meisel (who replaces former bassist Andre Couto) to the line-up also sees the Russos sound itself move into whole new territories. “The synths really opened up the sound of the band and gave more routes for the music to journey down”, drummer and vocalist João Pimenta says. The latest single and the album’s opening-track ‘Station Europa’ makes clear from the off that the 10 000 Russos sound is henceforth evolving – driven as it is by an enveloping synth bassline whilst electronics oscillate and whirr in the background.
Whilst the sound might be transforming, one constant is in the band’s founding mission to make “submersive music with subversive lyrics”. Evidence of their not wanting to shy away from uncomfortable truths, ‘Station Europa’ certainly fulfills on both fronts – with guitarist Pedro Pestana describing it as “a twisted anthem for the end of Europe, in which the once-sacred French words Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité are contradicted by a heritage of bureaucracy that gets in the way of a fellow member’s call for help.” ‘No more French words!’, drummer/vocalist João Pimenta sarcastically quips, amongst such other lyrical highlights as: ‘The remains of the Romans / Toga ghosts discussing ethics, beauty and how to cook a Flamingo’; ‘Hi Brussels, this is Greece, you have a problem, we need help / Arrange a meeting / You need a suit / You need a briefcase / You need shiny shoes’.