'This Radiation' is taken from Claire's 2001 debut album 'Captain Captain'.  The home recorded album was never officially released, aside from dubbed cassettes and burnt CDs with photocopied covers.  This year, 2013, the album has been mastered for the first time, and is now finally seeing its first official release courtesy of Night Owl Records!

this radiation

First single from Claire's new album 'Electricity', which is due out on May 4th 2015 on Night Owl Records.

View the official video here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8wvh2bIv98 

Head to Bandcamp to purchase the single here:
https://clairebirchall.bandcamp.com/album/take-it-easy-maryjane-single

'Take it easy MaryJane' was written, recorded, played and mixed by Claire Birchall, with Matt Green on harmonica.
Mastered by Greg Wadley.

Copyright 2015 Claire Birchall

Take It Easy MaryJane

MOVE ON song credits:
Released May 30th 2012
Written, performed, recorded and mixed by Claire Birchall
Mastered by LIndsay Gravina at Birdland Studios
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MOVE ON' is the first single to the forthcoming album by Claire Birchall, titled 'PP'. 
This single is available from May 30th 2012 for digital download at bandcamp. 
The album will be available for digital download at bandcamp on June 16th, 
and the CD is out in stores in Melbourne on June 23rd.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
**PRESS RELEASE**
CLAIRE BIRCHALL: PP - Album out June 2012 on Night Owl Records
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Emerging from a suburban Melbourne bedroom with a floor in a tangle of guitar 
leads and pedals, is Claire Birchall's second officially released solo album, 
simply titled with the musical acronym, PP. This is Claire's first solo album in 
over 10 years, since self-releasing the home recorded 'captain captain' in 2001. 
In the meantime, the prolific song-writer has been busy fronting noisy indie rockers 
Paper Planes, as well as making up one fifth of garage country rock band The Happy
 Lonesome. An avid home-recorder since the '90s, Claire continues to be a loyal 
devotee of the 4track cassette, entirely producing 'PP' on that same Tascam she 
bought as a teenager. This latest release also sees her pairing up with some 
old friends, calling in Daniel Herring for some guest guitar and Linsday Gravina 
at Birdland Studios for the mastering.

The spark that inadvertently turned into an album came after a friend suggested 
that Claire cover the '80s Bangles hit 'Manic Monday'. With an old Casio keyboard, 
Big Muff fuzz guitar, and some fx pedal experimentation, she completed the song 
in an afternoon. What surprised the artist was the fact that this funny little set up 
seemed to be the exact inspiration she needed at the time. More tracks quickly 
followed, and so the album began to grow. The end result is a mix of new and old, 
songs and sounds. PP serves as a showcase for Claire's many musical personas, 
from physchedelic rock ('Really Got Me Down'), to spooky melancholy ('Loser') and 
aching heart country ('Leaving This Town'). Album single 'Move On' particularly shows 
off her keenness for experimentation, and its quirky upbeat yet downbeaten pop 
flavour is quite unlike she's ever created before.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE LAUNCH
Claire Birchall and her band of close friends will be launching PP on Saturday 
June 30th at the Workers Club in Fitzroy. Ali E, MSG (Mia Schoen Group) and 
Michael Plater join the bill on the night. Doors open at 7:30pm, and entry is $8. 
Copies of PP will be available at the show.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Move On

'Manic Monday' - Written by Prince
Performed, recorded and mixed by Claire Birchall
Mastered by Lindsay Gravina at Birdland Studios

'Manic Monday' is taken from Claire's latest solo album 'PP'.  The full album is available from June 16th 2012 for digital download at:
http://clairebirchall.bandcamp.com 
The album will be instore in Melbourne on June 23rd.

Claire and friends will be launching her PP album on Saturday June 30th at the Workers Club in Fitzroy.  She will be joined on the bill by Ali E, MSG and Michael Plater.  Doors 7:30pm, entry $8



manic monday

According to Mess and Noise, Claire Birchall is “a genuinely brilliant songwriter who should be lauded more frequently”.  She has so far released four incredibly diverse albums, including one by her full-tilt rock band Paper Planes (2008 ‘Paper Planes’).  A talented multi-instrumentalist and DIY enthusiast, Claire self-records, mixes, and plays the majority of the instruments on all of her solo albums.  She is now set to release her fourth, titled ‘Electricity’, due out this May.

Claire’s 4track recording obsession began when she was a teenager in the ‘90s.  To this day she continues to record all of her solo releases as such, with no plans of “going digital”.  Due to the many years of developing her recording craft she is capable of creating lush sounding albums that are far from “lo-fi”.  Her first solo album, 'This Gallery of Mine' (1999) was a cassette only release that circulated throughout the Geelong underground, gaining her some local cred, gigs and Geelong radio spots.  Her follow up, 2001’s ‘Captain Captain’, became a Melbourne community radio favourite, scoring a spot in Triple R’s Soundscape Top 10.  It’s intricately layered instrumentation and sweet vocal harmonies captured widespread interest and a host of fans.  'Gallery' and 'Captain' were belatedly officially released in 2013.  

Greatly admiring chameleon artists such as Neil Young and Beck, Claire likewise carries a minor aversion to sticking to the one sound for too long.  Although she loved fronting Paper Planes, whose successes included the critically acclaimed self-titled album (“Words fail me. Perfect.” – M&N), when they suddenly disbanded, she seized the opportunity to take a new path.  As Claire told an interviewer in 2013, “I'd been doing the Paper Planes indie rock thing for a long time [and] you start getting in a bit of a box in terms of what songs you can do. I had been really neglecting my home-recording stuff too.”  For the next few months she chronicled a new collection of songs with the help of her Casio keyboard, guitars, and army of effects pedals.  What resulted was the album ‘PP’, “an extraordinary mélange of basic beats, distorted keyboard and guitar, and pop songs of exceptional resilience” (M&N), worthy of being “a serious contender for the best of 2012” (Lorraine Crescent).  Her cover of The Bangles ‘Manic Monday’ was a Triple R Breakfasters staple for endless weeks.  

With her 4tracking fixation reignited by ‘PP’, Claire instantly moved on to recording new songs.  Two years later, ‘Electricity’, was finally complete.  In the artist’s words, “I’ve got finicky with this new album ... every time I record a new song, I think ‘Oh, that’s actually better than one I thought was good enough.’... I’ve been using my loop pedal a bit, I’ve mixed things up … between loops – fuzzy guitar – but it’s also got a bit of a country vibe.  It’s different from PP; not as much drums”.   An incredible amount of instrumental tracking was done for record, producing a dramatic wall of sound.  As for the mood, Greg Wadley, who mastered the album, said it “sounds like Coburg”.  Most would likely place the album under the indie-rock banner, but from the country stylings of ‘Maryjane’ to the self-proclaiming ‘Rock and Roll Girl’, gloomy ‘80s pop inspired ‘Lucky Charm’, and noise guitar driven ‘Magnetic Field’, ‘Electricity’ proves that Claire is an artist that can cross a variety of genres with ease.

In mid-2014 Claire put together a new band, Claire Birchall & the Phantom Hitchhikers, featuring Bec Birchall (Paper Planes) on keys/vocals, Pete Azzopardi (The Coves/The Happy Lonesome) on bass/vocals, Jarrod Brown (The Coves) on drums, and Matthew Green (The Happy Lonesome) on harmonica.  Birchall & the Hitchhikers have been lurking around the last few months playing songs from ‘Electricity’ and Claire’s previous work in preparation for the album release.  They’ve found an immediate chemistry, and all agree this is a band that was meant to play together.



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