Fields of Industry…kind of like “Captains of Industry” only like with a field, or something with a touch more hazy drug influenced backgrounds.
So, yeah. What is going on here is some indie-psych soundtrack from Lansing Michigan entitled “Fields of Industry”. I am fairly new to FoI and not necessarily up to date with my Michigan trivia other than references of “Motor City” and “Great Lakes” and that ilk. I am not sure if I am projecting, but Fields of Industry could be an aura of tired factory worker going on a journey through some of the sparse wilderness of the upper peninsula. So again, I don’t really know anything about Michigan. I do know that they are surprisingly full of great indie talent and Fields of Industry are included among this pool.
Fields of Industry can be overly ambient, offensively lo-fi and even ridiculously full of psych-folk. Stop right there, this is a good thing, as a matter of fact it can be a great thing. We all know we are here at Slowcoustic and we should be expecting it, but it always brings warmth to my cockles when I find a new band such as this foursome (or five-some apparently). Regardless if they have ranged from as few as 2 up to the apparent five-some, this is quality shoegaze fronted by vocalist Joshua Barton along with Eric Gallippo, Joel Schrauben, Jacob Walbridge, Allison Stanley (depending on the show…apparently).
FoI have a couple of releases starting with a self titled “Fields of Industry”, follow up “Dogs” and the newly released “Two Dogs, A Television”. I have included a couple of favourites with this post starting with “Ramona Bopper” which could be a long lost Mark Kozelek track from their “Dogs” EP. Also included is the live version of “Fiction Writer” from their latest release along with “Point of Contention”. As a bonus, check out the video for Point of Contention from Vimeo below;
Fields of Industry – Point of Contention from Arts vs. Entertainment on Vimeo.
Visit Fields of Industry on MySpace, Arts vs Entertainment (see the “releases” for many downloads) and pick up a copy of “Two Dogs, A Television” over at eMusic & iTunes.
~Smansmith