Centripetal Force is excited to announce the release of the new album from The Royal Arctic Institute. The album will be made available on vinyl, as well as on CD and digitally. The preorder goes live on March 18. Its release date is May 2.
When I sent this album to a close friend a few weeks back, he asked, "What's this?" I said, "My inability to move away from the pedal steel guitar." He got back to me a while later and claimed the album to be "The most Centripetal Force thing I have ever heard." I assure you this was not by design.
Mike Horn (Seawind of Battery) put The Royal Arctic Institute on my radar a couple years back. I was intrigued. At the time their material did not feature the pedal steel guitar. They gave off a sort of West Coast post-rock kind of vibe that reminded me of bands like Tarentel, Tristeza, and other similar groups that dominated the Bay Area scene in the late 90s and early 2000s. As the demos of the new album came my way and I learned of RAI's plan to work pedal steel guitar into the mix, I was not disappointed. It was marrying two worlds of music that I enjoy very much. And now, a few months down the road, this album has come to fruition.
All of the members of The Royal Arctic Institute carry impressive resumes of past work, ranging from Das Damen to Townes Van Zandt to Arthur Lee to Roky Erickson. They've been creating sound for a long time, and as these guys will tell you, this is their most accomplished work to date.
"Twigs of Cries, Feathers of Sobs" will be the lead "single" and will debut March 18. The album will go up for preorder on the same day. Release day is May 2, 2025.
Preorder the album from Centripetal Force,
