Heliconia, whose guitar-driven sound has been described as neo-shoegazer, have recorded an EP, an album and a download release for isolation.
The three-piece, featuring Mike on guitar and vocals, Neil on bass and Jon on drums, gigged extensively in London and Brighton, honing their powerful live sound, in the lead up to the release of their album Glad You Were Born in the summer of 2006.
Glad You Were Born
Glad You Were Born, which includes work done with producer Pat Collier (Primal Scream, House of Love), captured the band's distinctive combination of laidback stoner grooves alternating with sheets of guitar and distortion.
Whether it’s the plaintive but powerful Bliss, a wall of noise rising from stuttering drums and resigned vocals; the delicately haunting Girl I Need You – music for walking along rainy 4am streets; the bass-sculpted Loose Ends, all jittery guitars, angst and adrenalin; or the hushed boy/girl vocals, reciting some private mantra, of Deep In Winter.
A review of Glad You Were Born on webzine shotgunreviews.com commented on Heliconia’s “dynamic mix of neo and classic shoegaze”, concluding that the album “should bring the band some of the attention and respect they so richly deserve”.
In 2007, Heliconia followed up Glad You Were Born with a download release Your Face.
The band have also recorded a corrosive take on Ride classic Drive Blind for the Clubac30 compilation Never Lose That Feeling. One review described it as “adding a dreamier/druggier edge to the verse, but leaving the impeccable dynamics untouched”.
Heliconia have played numerous gigs with German electronic artist Ulrich Schnauss, who had been impressed by the band's debut EP Girl I Need You.
Girl I Need You
Girl I Need You was released on on Isolation in 2003, when Heliconia also included Heidi on guitar, keyboards and vocals. A review of demo versions of some of the tracks described them as "beautiful".
The title track, underpinned by a simple keyboard motif and offset by off-kilter samples, was described as "stunning" by Organ magazine.
Shapes in the Dark is all guitar and distorted vocals; powerful, effective. The Organart review said in another time and place this would have been a shoegazing classic in the Chapterhouse/Slowdive mould.
Innerise - the main man behind Distant Noise Records - took the Heliconia sound in a very different direction in his remix of Girl I Need You, building a dark, brooding ambientscape around fragments of Heidi's vocals.
Walking Without Moving combines haunting, chiming guitars with breathless vocal lines which give way to a soaring sound. "This is one of the most beautiful things we've heard in a long, long time," said the review in Organ. "It glows."