House for Sale Finally. The long awaited third album from It’s Immaterial is nearly with us. The tracks were begun and abandoned in the early 90s. The tapes and files forgotten about until the duo cleared their old studio and rediscovered the songs. Over the past few years they have crowdfunded the completion of the album House For Sale and it is finally on sale via the good people at Burning Shed. Intelligent, low key, emotional, lyrical, late night music. Vaguely like The Blue Nile, with whom they share a producer in Calum Malcolm. I’ve ordered mine!
Thanks ordered my copy via your link... The Blue Nile's "Hats" is one of my favourite albums... I was amazed how similar It's Immaterial's "Song" album sounded to "Hats"... ...hopefully this will be just as good.
That's interesting, I have an old compilation that has a great song by this band and your thread has piqued my interest to check them out. If they found the original tapes when moving studios in 2012 presumably they never left the music biz but just stopped making their own music.
This bodes well... Off topic: Anyone heard the 2009 reissue of Song (Cherry Red)? How does it compare to the 1990 CD?
Massive fan, and I literally just found out about this release. I've had an mp3 of "Just North of Here" for years, which I think is an awesome track, and I've been wondering if this album would ever see the light of day.
I really want to order this, but I'm wondering if I should hold off a bit to see if it might be available domestically. (Shipping from Burning Shed in the UK to the US isn't bad, but I've had a couple instances of super long shipping delays from the UK since the whole Covid mess began.)
I had originally purchased this through the Pledge Music campaign (from like four or five years ago - and then crowdfunded the group again with some more funds after Pledge crashed and burned). Thus, I was in the first batch that Burning Shed sent out at the end of last week and I just received my copy today in California - so it was less than a week for shipping. However, I have had several other packages from the UK that were significantly delayed due to COVID and USPS political drama so it's hard to predict which items might get delayed. Listening to the CD now for the first time and I am pleasantly surprised with my first reactions. I usually need a couple listens before I am drawn to a new album but this one is making a nice impression with me right out of the gate. I hadn't made the connection with The Blue Nile in the previous It's Immaterial albums from the late 1980s/early 1990s but I definitely hear the similarities in this new release.
got mine yesterday from Burningshed, 4 years and 1 day after I pre ordered it from Pledge Music. Many Many thanks to Campbell and Whitehead, you are men of honor. another band, which shall remain nameless, provided flac downloads vai Pledgemusic just before they went belly up, and I heard they fulfilled some of their physical media orders, but not mine. you win some, you lose some, but I'm leery of the crowd funder 'pay before it exists' model
My copy of House for Sale arrived today, only a week and two days after Burning Shed shipped it, which is pretty darn good coming from the UK to California. Super excited to sit down and listen to it - hopefully tonight or tomorrow!
Just listened to it tonight, and it's a gorgeous, moving album. It's very consistent and cohesive too - not a bad song to be found, and all the tracks flow together seamlessly. It's quite similar to Song, but definitely not a carbon copy. It has a similar low-key mood and lots of attractive, sophisticated, yet understated melodies, and fairly simple yet smart, artful arrangements, but there's a certain immediacy or directness to many of these songs, as opposed to the slightly hazier and sort of amorphous sound of many of Song's tracks. Anyone who likes their previous work should like this too, and there really should be more than just half a dozen people in this thread discussing this album. I look forward to spending a lot more time with it.
It really is a gorgeous sumptuous album. Beautifully written, performed and recorded. I must have played it 20 times sine I received it last week. I'm so glad that John and Jarvis persisted with the project and brought it to fruition. Many others would have given up, so huge respect is due to them. You're correct Pavol - wouldn't you just love to tell the whole world about this album - it really is that good. Happy days!
I am enjoying the songs on the album... ...but find the CD sound a bit jacked up. Has anyone compared the vinyl and cd - does the vinyl have more dynamic range?
Another original Pledger here. Just discovered this thread after spotting it on the first page earlier. Never thought this would see a proper release after the Pledgemusic fiasco but happy to finally have this CD in my collection. Wonderful that these guys are back. The album doesn't seem to adhere very closely to the original tracklisting so hopefully there are plenty of songs left over for a fairly speedy follow-up, by which I mean not another 30 years.
Someone has recently posted some tracks to YouTube - I wonder if those are some of the songs you're talking about? Do a search for It's Immaterial and House for Sale, and you'll see some clips come up described as being unreleased tracks which are not included on the new House for Sale release.
Yes, the history of this album is convoluted with songs being reworked and/or retitled, newer/better songs replacing tracks originally intended for the album etc. I'm more than happy with how it turned out though. I know the guys offered several songs as downloads via Pledge while they were working on the album but, except for "Manchester Mambo", it appears I didn't download them myself thinking they would eventually appear on the album. It's possible those are the tracks now appearing on YouTube.
Reminder set on my phone: Life's Hard And Then You Die is the subject of Tim's Listening Party on Twitter 13th April @ 2100 hrs UK time. Can't come soon enough.
Just noticed on their Facebook page that they announced in 2021 they would be working on a completely new album. No updates in over a year though, so I guess we can only wait and hope.
Well, considering it took nearly thirty years to get House For Sale finished, I would settle back for a long wait !
Let's hope they realize waiting another thirty years just isn't an option......father time is catching up to all of us!
Some guy on eBay trying to sell a vinyl copy for $229. Don't fall for it friends...it's still available on Burning Shed for £25.
