Love Tractor - Themes From Venus (Remastered Expanded Edition)

Expanded album release via Propeller Sound Recordings out on CD and digital now. On Black & Indie Exclusive opaque yellow vinyl August 26 (Expanded tracks on CD and digital only)

“Themes From Venus presaged the future: Tame Impala’s blissed-out electro, thrumming ’90s post-rock and the success of freewheeling pop merchants such as Pixies.” – ANNIE ZALESKI, JOURNALIST/AUTHOR

Art Rock pioneers and founders of the Athens, Georgia alternative music scene, Love Tractor, bookended the Eighties with two superb, unique records: 1982’s self-titled debut and 1988’s Mitch Easter-produced Themes From Venus, the band’s fourth album. An expanded, remastered reissue is out now.

The band’s goal for Themes From Venus was simple. “Themes was meant to work as a whole, to be listened to as one piece of music,” Cline says. “We were very much digging back into our high school years, where an album communicated much more than bad production and a couple of singles. We really wanted the album to function like Bowie’s Low, with a rock side, and then a more aesthetic side. But one hitch was we couldn’t time the record (vinyl) so that Venice was on side A with all the rockers. We’ve fixed that with the CD rerelease.”

Indeed, Themes From Venus flows nicely from beginning to end. The first half offers up some great rockers, from the surreal opening track, “I Broke My Saw” through the psych-rock of the title track and the catchy-as-hell “Satan’s New Wave Soul Losers.” The second half finds the band diving into headier waters, where neo-Robert Fripp-styled guitar and pop-rock blend together on “Crystal World,” while the driving, hypnotic rock of “Venice” can’t help but charm the listener. Themes From Venus is a loud tribute to various rock stylings, sounding both seemingly familiar and yet foreign and new.