This Heat - This Heat *Pre-Order

Release Date Friday 12th June 2026
All pre-orders will be dispatched/made ready for collection on that day.

‘They went beyond punk before punk had properly started…the entire album is a
controlled explosion of ideas. Nearly fifty years on, This Heat’s debut is something
the world has still not completely caught up with.’ - Simon Reynolds
‘Over the years, there have been bands to play as aggressively, or even as
strangely, but very few have been able to rise from their collective influences and
histories to create music so singularly distinctive and inspiring.’ – Pitchfork 9/10
‘This Heat sounded like the future then ... and still do now.’ - Dan Snaith (Caribou)
Although widely considered to be Post-Punk’s finest, This Heat actually began
performing and recording their music in 1976, the early days of London’s punk era.
Within their two albums and an EP they perfected a strange and volatile new strain
of avant-garde rock that time has proved to be massively influential, a blueprint for
much that would follow: post-rock, math rock, homemade musique concrète,
experimental electronica.
Numerous critics have recognised the band's influence on the music of Sonic
Youth, Glenn Branca, Steven Wilson, Public Image Ltd., Radiohead, Swans,
Shellac, Young Knives, Black Dice, Lightning Bolt and numerous other
experimental and post-rock bands. Disbanding in 1982 they have left an undeniable
legacy that has only continued to grow in stature and relevance.

The album This Heat, also known to fans and critics as the ‘Blue and Yellow’, was
their eponymous debut release, recorded in sessions between February 1976 and
September 1978 in a variety of studios including their own Cold Storage, a
converted cold storage room in the Acme Studios complex. Innovating throughout,
they combined loops and tape manipulation (producing for example the proto-drum
and bass ‘24 Track Loop’) with live performance and haunting vocals to a complex,
dissonant whole. The band recorded everything they ever did – including gigs – and
tracks such as “Water” were entirely improvised in the studio.
Having recently passed the 50 year anniversary of their first gig, and the recording
of material that appears on their debut album, the group’s surviving members
Charles Bullen and Charles Hayward, true to their DIY roots, have set up an imprint
to release their recordings for their growing fan base that is increasingly recognising
their influential place in music history. 

Track List: 1. Testcard, 2. Horizontal Hold, 3. Not Waving, 4. Water, 5. Twilight
Furniture, 6. 24 Track Loop, 7. Diet of Worms, 8. Music Like Escaping Gas, 9.
Rainforest, 10. The Fall of Saigon, 11. Testcard (Locked Groove)

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