Bingo Fury

‘Bingo Fury: the beat generation meets Throbbing Gristle’ - Loud & Quiet

‘He has an ability to transport you through not just music but ebbs and flows through layers and plots; all of which are bewildering, in the best kind of way.’ - The Quietus

‘The Bingo Fury world is only just beginning to reveal itself, but it is already unlike anything else’ - NME

One-off talent and rising alternative artist Bingo Fury today reveals ‘Mr Stark’, the electrifying third single from his much-anticipated debut album Bats Feet For A Widow due 16 February via state51.

Exemplifying the surreal worlds that Bingo Fury creates, ‘Mr Stark’ is an ode to the enigmatic fictional character ‘Mr Stark’. It undulates between urgent bursts of jerky, Arto Lindsay-esque guitar and melodic crooning, with abstract lyrical brilliance shining through in lines like: “he sparkles like hospital floors / My eyes are buried in you, Mr Stark!”. These lyrics are an inspired nod to Silver Jews’ David Berman, whose 1999 poetry collection Actual Air is an influence throughout the album. ‘Mr Stark’ is a spellbinding piece of avant-garde music, pushing boundaries and defying genre.

On the single, Bingo Fury says: "Mr Stark was a half-preconceived, half-improvised song that we pieced together in the church as we were recording. I was sent off to the local park to write lyrics and a vocal melody the day we recorded it. I hate writing this way, without being able to meticulously iron out the creases. In hindsight, the spontaneity added an urgency to the song, which  made it more infectious than it might have been if it were more considered."

Bats Feet For A Widow is an album filled with noir elegance that revels in extremity. The album was recorded in a local church in Bristol, taking inspiration from the musician’s complex relationship with his strong religious upbringing. The influence of the church building resonates throughout the album.

The record is full of strange experiments, obscure references, offbeat one-liners, heart-breaking sentimentality and surging creativity. At the heart of it all is Bingo Fury’s crooning bass vocal, lending a vivid and slyly humorous voice to universal themes of love and pain.

Although very much a solo songwriter, Bingo Fury’s compositional process relies on contributions from his entire band - bassist Megan Jenkins and drummer Henry Terrett have been playing together since their teens. In one of their various incarnations, they recruited local avant-jazz legend, cornet player Harry ‘Iceman’ Furniss, with guitarist and percussionist Rafi Cohen later completing the line-up.

Mr Stark follows the release of heartwrenching ballad ‘Leather Sky’ and the cacophonous single ‘Power Drill’, which both garnered praise from The Line Of Best Fit and DIY. This comes after Bingo Fury’s debut EP, ‘Mercy’s Cut’, that came out last year to an abundance of critical acclaim from the likes of BBC 6 Music, The Quietus, Loud & Quiet, Clash, as well as earning himself a spot on the NME Top 100. Filled with rich, cinematic allure, the EP is both beautiful and unsettling and underlines Bingo Fury’s complete abundance of compositional ideas.

Alongside new music, Bingo Fury is playing shows across the UK, including a tour with Folly Group and Bristol and London dates.

Bingo Fury bio:

Bingo Fury’s noirish, furiously inventive music – marrying Scott Walker-esque balladry, poised jazz and agitated no-wave – has marked him amongst the UK avant-garde’s most exciting young voices. The multi-instrumentalist and madcap producer’s debut album Bats Feet For A Widow arrives February 16th via The state51 Conspiracy.

Bats Feet For A Widow was recorded in a local church in Bristol, inspired by Fury’s tangled feelings towards his strong religious upbringing. We hear the old building everywhere, amidst the rich jazz performances of his band: Meg Jenkins (bass), Henry Terrett (drums), Harry Furniss (cornet) and Rafi Cohen (guitar, glockenspiel, piano). We also hear tossed house keys, wine glasses and strange acousmatic experiments: all channelled into a powerfully cinematic, deeply romantic album. At its heart is Fury’s crooning bass vocal, lending a vivid and slyly humorous voice to universal themes of love and pain.

Bingo Fury burst onto the UK scene in 2021 with the debut single ‘Big Rain’, assembling his band from friends in Bristol’s rich experimental scene. Initially a grittier no-wave project, their magnetic, electrifying live shows led to early sets at End Of The Road and Green Man, as well as support slots with Lee Ronaldo and the godfather of no-wave himself: James Chance. By the release of Fury’s 2022 debut EP Mercy’s Cut, he had earned acclaim from tastemakers at BBC 6Music, The Quietus, NME, Loud And Quiet and more.

Bats Feet For A Widow marks a shift into more melodic territory. “I was bored of experimental music just being dissonant or atonal – a lot of the people I was influenced by really challenged me but also had a euphoric atmosphere to their output,” he explains. Citing Laurie Anderson, Robert Wyatt and Silver Jews as influences, the album is rooted in lush, piano-led balladry, but ricochets between punk, lounge pop and Reichian minimalism.

Lyrically, Fury’s esoteric, surreal style is indicated by the album’s title. “I like the idea that, in an alternate reality, giving a widow bat’s feet is a really kind gift,” Fury grins. Odd, abstract terms are given a strange emotional charge in this album, exploring love and the comfort to be found in shared difficulty. “As an adult, I’ve read maybe three books,” Fury claims: his language instead draws largely from street names and shopfronts. “I left the fire burning to meet you at Jaguar Shoes,” he croons in ‘Centrefold’, referencing the London venue Dream Bags Jaguar Shoes. ‘Unlistening’ references Bristol’s old “fireboat station”. “Henry was joking that in 30 years there’ll be a blue plaque tour of the ‘Bingo Fury Road Name Mentions.’” One book Fury does knows well is The Bible, and religious imagery proliferates from one of this track’s early declarations: “I was stunted by religion.”

Recording took place in Cotham Parish Church on the outskirts of Bristol: never previously used for recording music. Joined by Rockfield engineer Joe Jones, Fury and his band filled the church with equipment and worked there for eight days. “My main creative fuel is limitation,” Fury says of the decision to not use a studio: “in the process of working out a problem, you end up with something more interesting.” The decision to use a church specifically was drawn from his religious childhood. “I had a lot of very confusing experiences within the church growing up – recording in a church made the whole thing more intense, and amplified the discomfort of those experiences I was writing about.” This extended to his band. “A lot of people that are atheist will go into a church and experience a different kind of discomfort: ‘am I really meant to be here?’ That’s the side of production I find interesting – how you can get something different out of someone through the situation you’ve placed them in.”

The church became a laboratory for strange musical experiments, and is heard everywhere on the album: from the natural reverb (no artificial reverb is used) to samples of Fury hitting the organ’s pipes with a stick. On ‘I’ll Be Mountains’, Fury stood in the main hall and conducted live performances by his band. “Meg brought up the bass amp’s volume until it was so loud, everything in the church started shaking. Just before the climax of the song, a crucifix fell off the wall and skittered across the ground – you can hear it in the recording.” On the same track, Fury layered himself making sounds with wineglasses filled to various levels. Elsewhere, he positioned a microphone in the room’s centre and had the band stand around it, tossing their housekeys into the air and catching them. “I’m into using domestic objects within an arrangement – sounds you just find pleasing in general life.” Fury was also inspired by acousmatic music, layering two unmanipulated sounds to create something that sounds familiar, but can’t quite be identified: the distorted, alien chimes on ‘My Cup Overflows’ are just a guitar and glockenspiel being hit at the same time.

Bristol’s rich avant-garde scene has influenced this spirit of experimentation: Fury is part of a new wave of innovators from the city including Grove, Ishmael Ensemble and Giant Swan. “I feel constantly challenged by what’s going on there,” Fury says. “Everyone’s nurturing each other’s projects – I find it very invigorating.” The title of the warm, gorgeous instrumental ‘Never Gonna Be A Dead Man’ is a tribute to local experimental pop duo Robbie & Mona.

Bats Feet For A Widow is shaped in part by a tension between meticulous, melodically driven arrangements and free improvisation. On ‘Power Drill’, Steve Reich-esque piano arpeggios underpin a furious, punk-leaning guitar freakout. This track was written by Fury on a mobile app, while on the road working as a touring sound engineer. “It was originally three pianos. I brought it to the band, and suggested we had Harry and Rafi at the keyboard because there was so much piano going on. Rafi said ‘let me have a go’ and smashed it immediately.”

This love of contrast influences Fury’s slyly humorous, playful lyricism. The best example is ‘Mr Stark’: a bizarre ode to an “attention-grabbing” fictional character. Between bursts of jerky, Arto Lindsay-esque guitar, Fury croons ludicrous tributes to the song’s hero: “he sparkles like hospital floors / My eyes are buried in you, Mr Stark!” This is a matter in which Fury has been especially influenced by Silver Jews’ David Berman, whose 1999 poetry collection Actual Air is one of the three books Fury has read. “It’s just a more honest representation of existence when you have that light and shade.”

Amidst this offbeat humour, Bats Feet For A Widow is an album charged with real emotion. Closing track ‘Leather Sky’ may feature lines like “whistling in Portuguese,” but drives towards a heart-breaking refrain on Furniss’ cornet: “this is a new kind of pain” Fury sings. “When I listen to something I can really relate to, there’s a sense of release with that,” he says. He hopes this for the album’s listeners, and doesn’t believe it will be hindered by his odd, esoteric lyrics. “Other people will imprint their experience onto the songs, in the same way I’m doing. I wrote these lyrics and they mean so much to me, but I’m continually reinventing my relationship with them – I hope other people can do the same thing.”

For all its noirish elegance, Bats Feet For A Widow is an album of extremity. In all respects – its sonic palette, strange experiments, obscure references, offbeat one-liners, heart-breaking sentimentality and surging creativity – it is astonishingly full. Fury duly ends it on a note of maximalism: “you know I’m trying to give you everything / It all gets in the way.”

Bingo Fury’s noirish, furiously inventive music – marrying Scott Walker-esque balladry, poised jazz and agitated no-wave – has marked him amongst the UK avant-garde’s most exciting young voices. The multi-instrumentalist and madcap producer’s debut album Bats Feet For A Widow arrives February 16th via The state51 Conspiracy.

The album was recorded in a local church in Bristol and inspired by Fury’s tangled feelings towards his strong religious upbringing. We hear the old building everywhere amidst the rich jazz performances of his band: Meg Jenkins (bass), Henry Terrett (drums), Harry Furniss (cornet) and Rafi Cohen (guitar, glockenspiel, piano). We also hear tossed house keys, wine glasses and strange acousmatic experiments: all channelled into a powerfully cinematic, deeply romantic album. At its heart is Fury’s crooning bass vocal, lending a vivid and slyly humorous voice to universal themes of love and pain.

Bats Feet For A Widow is an album of extremity. In all respects – its sonic palette, strange experiments, obscure references, offbeat one-liners, heart-breaking sentimentality and surging creativity – it is astonishingly full. Fury duly ends it on a note of maximalism: “you know I’m trying to give you everything / It all gets in the way.”