Thick Terrain by Firestations

London dream-pop ensemble Firestations are back with their first full album in five years. Preceded by the single Undercover – an effervescent song about depression and self-discovery ­– Thick Terrain will be released on limited-edition 12” vinyl and digital platforms on July 14, 2023. A clear-eyed and bold statement, deftly combining big ideas with pop sensibilities in a captivating way, it’s the band’s best work to date. It follows Firestations’ expansive and explorative 2021 EP trilogy Automatic Tendencies, which garnered extensive support from BBC 6 Music including repeat plays from Gideon Coe, Cerys Matthews, Radcliffe & Maconie and in particular Marc Riley, who hailed the track ‘Small Island’ as “a perfect pop song”.

Firestations are Michael Cranny, Laura Copsey, Martin Thompson, Tom Hargreaves and Neil Walsh. Together they make music spanning genres from shoegazey indie to synth pop and harmony-driven psychedelia. Their debut album for Lost Map, The Year Dot, was released in 2018 and was hailed by The List magazine for “pursuing ambitious social commentaries while playfully teasing its own sonic glitches”. The Automatic Tendencies project – a prolific burst of creativity to stave off madness during lockdown – saw the band refine their brand of conceptual alt-pop, with songs taking a closer look at themes of identity, belonging, progress and escapism. It comprised three EPs released over a six-month period – Automatic Tendencies, Melted Medium and Pixel Wilderness –­­­ each embracing a mixtape aesthetic, by including alternative “sunken” versions by the band as well as covers and remixes of new Firestations tracks by other artists. Copsey, who is an illustrator, curated collections of unique limited-edition artworks that expanded on ideas within each release, from a brass chip fork to a ceramic mountain.

Thick Terrain sees Firestations find their way back to the full album format again at last, following a period of writing and reconfiguration – bassist Giles Littleford departing for the Midlands, replaced by Walsh. In mid-2022 the band entered Otterhead Studios in Warwickshire, and quickly turned out a set of songs which felt like they belonged together. Ten tracks, ranging from cyclical hypnotic sci-fi numbers to addictive dream-pop jangles, exploring ideas around identity, conflict, progress and sanity, or a lack of it. “Where is the joy?” sings chief songwriter Cranny on ‘Undercover’. “Is it over? Where is the joy? Still undercover?”

“Album titles are tricky,” says Cranny, of the story behind Thick Terrain. “You just sort of have to go fishing in your subconscious until you catch something that speaks to you. We had a series of pub-based meetings, where we free-associated some of the meanings of the songs, just blurted things out and wrote them down. The regulars probably thought we were crazy.

“There were themes of strange landscapes, psychology and disillusionment in the music. Laura came up with ‘ick terrain’ – she’d been watching Love Island at the time (which she insists was cultural research) – apparently ‘ick’ is a thing and we liked the sound. The music also feels grounded in place, which speaks to the ‘terrain’ part. We then adapted it to Thick Terrain, as Laura felt this would fit well with artwork ideas, given she is a big fan of thick milkshakes. It was then only a slight sidestep to the ‘jelly on a spoon’ album cover (see below) – a collaboration with our good friends and artists KeelerTornero – weird joy embedded in the landscape. Thick Terrain had a nice weighty kind of weirdness about it that we all gravitated towards. It felt like it just had to be the title. We’re all in the thick terrain.”

DIY label, run by Pictish Trail, from his caravan on the Isle of Eigg, Scotland.