Conus sp. Bent

Drawing from his studies in Sound Arts, a childhood obsession with experimental guitar playing, and a penchant for making homemade electronic albums in his spare time, the work of South London’s Conus sp. Bent (moniker of Alex Goodall, also a member of Dog and Kissing Gate) is constructed using indie-rock’s most rudimentary tools, but results in anything but.

Released via My Life Is Big - the independent label/artistic collective founded by Tapir!’s Ike Gray - and produced in collaboration with Honeyglaze’s Yuri Shibuichi (mary in the junkyard, wonderbug) -To Within An Inch - due 10th February - offers Conus sp. Bent’s second album in as many years. Spiky and tender;  heartfelt and humorous; as playfully unpredictable as it is elegantly simple; the album draws upon a catalogue of themes, inquiries and thought processes which reach across a sprawling and indeterminate period of Goodall’s life. Fictional and factual,  it draws on memory but extrapolates.

Including stories constructed from journal entries  (‘Even A Worm Will Turn’), reflections on the AIDS epidemic (‘Drifty’) and watching the Old Grey Whistle Test with his dad (‘Local News’), lead single ‘Like a Dog’ - out today (30th January), reflects bittersweetly on Goodall’s late dog Fraiser. A fragrant breeze of hypnotically sweet and catchy riffs, it’s a track that nonetheless itches and fidgets beneath its surface, ever-ready to transform into new and mutated beginnings. 

Offering more on the single, Goodall says: “‘Like a Dog’ celebrates the curious life of my old pal Fraiser. He was my best friend and, though we knew each other so well, he never said a word. I always liked to speculate on what he might have been thinking – this song is an ode to never quite knowing.”