Purity Ring
Canadian electronic duo Purity Ring waited 18 months to play songs from their latest album in concert. So it’s not wrong to consider “Womb,” although released in April of 2020, brand new. In pandemic
-altered time, the Tour de Womb finally coming to Revolution Live in Fort Lauderdale on July 9 after delays and more delays is delivering something that hadn’t fully emerged into the world until now.
And the arrival in June of a new 7-song EP, “Graves,” means Purity Ring aren’t asking for Covid dispensations. They’ll have even more new music to draw on for their first tour in five years.
The centerpiece on record, as always, is the surreal pairing of Corin Roddick’s driving electro beats and Megan James’ dreamy voice: Imagine German electronic pioneers Tangerine Dream with 21st Century audio capability and Gwen Stefani singing. “Womb” is an optimistic soundtrack for a dreary time, and a soaring James reaches such impossibly high notes that Pitchfork mistakenly attributed her range to digital manipulation.
Absent touring, they went into the studio. Out popped a cover of Alice DJ’s ubiquitous club single, “Better Off Alone,” sounding sexier and slightly less familiar; then “Knife Prty,” their contribution to a Deftones remix set; and then, last summer, “Soshy,” a Purity Ring single complete with their trademark irresistible, head-bopping beats and James’ incredible vocals. The accompanying video, swimming with archival footage, evokes a club space where old reels play on the wall while a killer song thumps across the floor.
In pre-pandemic 2020 James told DIY magazine about translating “Womb” into live settings: “We don’t have everything figured out and it’s all in drawings at this point, but we really want it to feel warm and quite literal.” Two years later she tells The Complex that touring is urgent to their livelihoods even if it’s not entirely safe “because no one’s wearing masks.” She also said, “I want to be on the stage again, because I love it. I miss it.”
Purity Ring perform with ekkstacy at 7pm on Saturday, July 9 at Revolution Live in Fort Lauderdale. purityringthing.com ~ David Rolland
