With the 2010 release of a lo-fi folk project, Talking Machine, North Carolina-based multi-instrumentalist and singer/songwriter Stephen Warwick first caught local attention as the album landed on Shuffle Magazine‘s top 10 list that year. By 2013, Warwick sought out a new musical outlet and when he went into the studio to write and record material, he enlisted friends to join him, including The New Familiars’ Justin Fedor, with whom Warwick set out on tour as Ancient Cities, a project that derives its name from a childhood dream. After recruiting a rotating cast of musicians including Justin Faircloth (organ, synth) and Matt Curl (drums), the band has spent time touring up and down the East Coast while working on their sophomore effort Supermoon Blackout which will drop tomorrow.
With the release of the album’s latest single “Marmalade,” the band has expanded upon the sound that has first caught the attention of the blogosphere — while sounding as though it were inspired by The Black Keys as the members of Ancient Cities pair layers of buzzing guitars, propulsive rhythms, an anthemic hook that you hear a packed house yelling along and a swaggering self-assuredness that gives the song a larger-than-life feel.
