News: Dissociates Reveal ‘Useless Wooden Toys’ Video + Announce New Album

London punk rock powerhouse DISSOCIATES are delighted to share their debut album 'A Capital Idea' set for release on 10th November 2017 through Safety Second Records. 

Recorded at Middle Farm Studios, Devon with James Bragg (Cock Sparrer, Solemn Sun, Woahnows) the 10-track album contains 5 brand new songs and 5 tracks from their previous EP - 'After Hours At The Violet Club'.

The album artwork, revealed today features the iconic George Major wearing a radiation mask imagining "A London which continues to thrive with the backdrop of low-level radioactive fallout". Also known as the 'Pearly King of Peckham' George comes from a long line of working-class Londoners who don magnificent suits and hats and raise money for charitable causes. Commenting on the artwork and the ideas behind it, vocalist/guitarist Dan Stevens explains: 

"We wanted to contrast something traditionally London with the imagined future of fallout. That's where the idea of getting a Pearly came from. It would have been disrespectful to have faked it so that's when we got in touch with George Major. He's not just 'a Pearly' he's King Pearly and president of the Guild of Pearlies.

At 84 he's a living legend and we were honoured to have him part of our story. When David Gill heard what we were doing he very kindly offered his services and really captured George's dignity in the photo". 

To celebrate the release of their first full-length album the band have shared a brand new music video for their new track 'Useless Wooden Toys' taken from the forthcoming album. 

Click here to watch 'Useless Wooden Toys': https://youtu.be/XLC-V9Em8QM

The release will be supported by UK and European touring including a free entry London album release show with support from River Jumpers, Sweet Empire and Harker at The Finsbury on November 11th organised by Punktastic.  

'A Capital Idea' is out Friday 10th November on Safety Second Records.  

TOUR DATES

Nov 02 - Lille FR, Do It Yourself Cafe

Nov 03 - Tours FR, Canadian Cafe

Nov 04 - Amiens FR, Sombrero Cafe

Nov 09 - Hastings UK, Flairz Bar

Nov 10 - Plymouth UK, The Junction

Nov 11 - London UK, The Finsbury

Nov 12 - Canterbury UK, Lady Luck

Nov 18 - London, UK, T-Chances

About 'A Capital Idea': 

“We were there with the Pearly King of Peckham,” laughs Dissociates frontman Dan Stevens. “He’s 86-years- old, and we had him wearing a radiation mask.”

That absurd but definitive shot of an “an old London boy” on the sleeve perfectly encapsulates what’s going on inside Dissociates’ bold and brave debut album ‘A Capital Idea’. Head of the Cockney Museum, he’s a man who’s seen it all. His main role is to be fully for the people, but he’s also full of filthy stories about Princess Margaret. Dressed as symbolic tribute to the past, but defaced by a damning indictment of the future.

Dissociates met as teenagers. After being in several bands through university, fate then took control when a “shit party” reunited them in their mid-20s. Rather than endure a “whack club”, they went for a drink and Dissociates were born.

Now 10 years and one new bassist later, the band have released acclaimed EPs through punk stalwart labels like Household Name, Disorder and Safety Second Records, they’ve won fans at home, and terrified audiences from old opera houses in Ukraine to abandoned Luftwaffe bunkers in Berlin. They’ve progressed from a “shouty skate-punk band” to a genre-crossing blast that’s considered and adventurous, but still driven by pure punk adrenaline. “We’ve outgrown our sloppy reputation, but we still wanna have fun,” as Dan puts it bluntly.

“We’ve always had an aversion to just doing formulaic stuff,” admits guitarist Ned Mendez. “You’ve got to mix it up a bit. The people who like us are the people who can appreciate that you can have some aggression as well as melody to get your head into. “Punk Rock” is a broad church. We’re not NOFX - we’re more down the Fugazi dial.”

Lyrically too, the band follow that post-hardcore spirit of taking what they know and taking it to new territories. In the case of Dissociates, the continuing decay of their native London is their biggest muse - but they also look further afield with a global lens. ‘A Capital Idea’ is equally as concerned with nuclear waste passing through the local London streets and their studio being sold off to build unaffordable flats, as it is with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster in Mexico.

“There’s a nuclear waste train which goes through my station every week,” says Dan of the track ‘Sweet 16’. “We could talk about nuclear war and dirty bombs but we’re not so far removed from that. Here’s a city of millions of people, all that waste has got to go somewhere and we’re all swimming in someone’s shit to a certain degree. It’s part and parcel of living here.”

Put that and the image of oil workers watching strippers dance at the weekend aside. If the record is in any way political, it’s not with a capital P - this is an album about real life.

“We could be banging on about Theresa May and all that but it dates it quite quickly,” admits Dan. “This is more personal-political, whatever that means. I try not to write too many songs about everything being fine and everyone getting together. It’s a great scene and city, but my experience has often been as an outsider.”

Ned adds: “We play a lot of benefits for homeless charities and leftwing causes, that’s definitely in our wheelhouse and where we come from - but musically we don’t want to ever be too preachy. Nobody wants to be lectured.”

Success, they admit comes simply being allowed to continue being Dissociates, getting from one gig to the next, playing punk and pushing things forward. ‘A Capital Idea’ is the perfect place to start. What does it say about the band? Just like when they put that gas mask on the Pearly King, it “disconnects the old from the new.”

It’s in that space frozen in time you’ll find Dissociates. It’s loud, and only now matters.