Yorkshire’s Louise Distras finally makes her long-awaited return in 2023 with her second album Beauty After Bruises, out now via Ministry Of Love Records Department.

Though often referred to as a punk artist, Louise says she’s much more than that. ”I’ve just always tried to write good songs that come straight from the heart, and songs that I want to hear,” she explains. “I was brought up on groups like the Bee Gees, Queen, ABBA and ELO. The thing I love the most about pop music is that there’s no stage big enough for it. So it doesn’t matter where I sing these songs, or even who hears me, as long as the people are welcome. From the start that’s always been my philosophy.”

Having made a name for herself with her Dreams From The Factory Floor debut, Louise’s mix of spiky energy, addictive melody and unvarnished lyrics quickly won her praise. Kerrang! magazine named her one of the Stars Of 2017. Her brilliant live shows, meanwhile, included touring with The Interrupters, Dropkick Murphys and The Subways, as well as punk heroes The Buzzcocks, The Damned and Mick Jones (The Clash). She also performed at Glastonbury Festival. Describing her onstage, Louder Than War declared: “Louise Distras is like that first vicious punch to the nose; you may feel it, it may hurt, it may be aggressive. But it’s the first time you’ve experienced anything like it, and secretly, you rather enjoyed the thrill.”

To make the follow-up, Louise headed to San Francisco, California, to record with Ross Peterson (Bruce Springsteen, Elle King, John Mayer) at 25th Street Studios. As soon as she arrived, she knew she was supposed to be there. “San Francisco was the west coast stomping ground for the writers of the beat generation,” she says. “It's a place of great significance for me as an ex-teenage runaway, because in the so-called "summer of love" alot of disenfrancised kids dropped out en masse and flocked to San Francisco with no money and no place to go, just the blind belief that when you get there you'll be taken care of...but there's razor blades in the candy floss. So by the whims of the great magnet I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be when I stepped off the plane. Hunter S Thompson said San Francisco is the kinda place where you can strike sparks anywhere, so it was the perfect place for me to make my record.”

With the pandemic putting heavy delays on finishing the album, it was finally completed with Stephen Street (The Cranberries, Blur, The Smiths) at Damon Albarn’s Studio 13 in West London. The result is a jagged, guitar-heavy pop record that both shines and bruises, taking in shades of Against Me!, Bob Dylan and classic ‘80s British indie to create a deeply personal and highly brilliant musical journal entirely of Louise’s own.

Describing the deceptively major-key content as “razor blades wrapped in candy floss”, into these songs Louise has put a huge spectrum of life, humanity, frustrations and big questions. There is, she says, a lot to unpack.

“I'd say the major differences between the first album and this one, emotionally, is that I felt at that time in my life like I was looking outwards, and saying, ‘here's what's wrong with me, here's what's wrong with the world. And it's the world's fault. It's the world that's doing it to me,’” she says. “But with Beauty After Bruises, I'm looking inwards. I'm saying, ‘Well, the way I see the world is actually because of the way that I see myself. I pulled the wool over my eyes for a long time, because I was still carrying bricks from my past. And if I carried them any longer, I would have been building the same house. So I had to get out of my own way.”

Explaining the title of the album, Louise says, “Sometimes you need to hide in the darkness for a bit, but the light never leaves you for good. Lockdown changed me, I'm a different woman now. I don't want to make music that's a space for the best, glossy version of myself so 'Beauty After Bruises' is about the ugly truth. This album is messy just like me and it's about honouring the parts of myself that I looked away from."

When it comes to the lyrics, meanwhile, Louise doesn’t hold anything back. Take Truth In Your Lies, “it's about San Francisco being a nerve centre of cultural and artistic activity awash with gurus, philosophers, preachers, cults and religions, everything imaginable on every street corner. It was the perfect hunting ground that opened up the possibility for predators and "gardeners" who would plant seeds in people's minds,” says Louise. “From all over the USA came hustlers, dope dealers and pimps like Charlie Manson whose philosophy for attracting his female followers was "always find the ones who are bent or cracked but not completely broken." So I wrote this song about finally moving on from the Spiral Staircase...”

Throughout, guest musicians help bring Louise’s vision to life, including keys from Mick Talbot (The Style Council / Dexy’s Midnight Runners), and Bruce Springsteen / Miley Cyrus / Puscifer drummer Gunnar Olsen on Drums. On one of the album’s highlights, Black Skies, Crass’ Steve Ignorant shows up to help fulfil Louise’s vision for the track of being “a nihilistic night terror masquerading as a street opera that sounds like The Clash’s Guns of Brixton meets Nirvana’s Territorial Pissings”

Though Covid has delayed things for Louise Distras, it’s also given her the chance to take stock and start over. Having had time to reflect on life, resurrection, survival of the soul and seek new meaning in life, with Beauty After Bruises she has poured it all into music, to re-emerge as a powerful and promising force of high-volume guitar-pop with a punk heart.

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The Ramonas

www.ramonas.co.uk
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email - book.the.ramonas@googlemail.com

A-M-I are a punk rock band, based in Brighton UK. 
Members: Marlon Payne- Lead guitar and BV
Bram Payne- Bass guitar and BV
Marley Perez- Rhythm guitar and Lead vocals
Harry Stagg- Drums
We have been putting on regular gigs in Brighton and Worthing, and have played all around Sussex. We have been working in studio 284 with Charlie Harper (UK Subs).

Every Friday and Saturday night at 8PM central, you can listen to my punk rock show on 90.3 WKWC, in Owensboro Kentucky. You can also stream it online. All of the links can be found on my facebook page. www.facebook.com/mikechaneyspunkrockshow

The Dollyrots are a punk rock band but their CDs are very pop. Rah rah rah. Kelly is sugar sweet but mischievous and might sucker punch you if you're dumb enough to try her patience. Which she has a lot of, if she hasn't been visiting her friends Jack, Jim or Jameson. She likes to do girl things like grow plants and sew up her t-shirts and crochet and make strawberry cakes. But she also likes to play her basses til they are sprinkled with blood and drives soo fast she's not allowed behind the wheel. She likes to get carsick reading and writing postcards from the road. Her favorite guy is Quito, her dog, who you'll meet after the show if you come see the band on tour. She loves Irish punk rock, girl groups, and anything off the "Dirty Dancing" soundtrack. And she smells great.

Then there is Luis... Luis is mysterious. And very smart. He is one of those guys who you meet and think maybe you'd join his cult. I hear he has his own religion, based on the Sun God so it's not really a stretch. Ask him about it sometime; he'll tell you about freaking that room full of people out while rambling about western religion while on some weird head trip. He is also known to get feisty when he's hungry or afraid he's getting sick. It's really easy to get Luis to flinch, he's not crazy about people touching him. Maybe it's because he was abducted by ETs when he lived in Ecuador as a child. He likes good Brit punk, music of the early 90's because it's honest and don't forget Chuck Berry and Patsy Cline. On the road he likes to read parts of books he never finishes and stare out the window. He's good to talk to.

The Dollyrots have released four full length albums and several singles and EPs through the Lookout, Blackheart, and Brando record labels. Their music has earned them song placements, commercials, and acting stints in film & TV including Disney/Pixar's Brave, Hewlett-Packard, Kohls, CSI:NY, among others. The band has logged hundreds of thousands of miles in the U.S. touring consistently since 2003, cultivating a rabidly loyal fan base while headlining and playing one-off shows in the US & UK alongside Bowling For Soup, Buzzcocks, and Joan Jett, Forever the Sickest Kids, Paramore, The Breeders, and The Go-Gos. The band is currently in studio recording their 5th LP, which is being put together with the direct support of their fans through PledgeMusic.

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