‘Welcome to the new age of new age’. So says Hatchback’s Sam Grawe on his second outing for Lo Recordings, the new CD and double LP ‘Zeus & Apollo’.

Like its predecessor ‘Colors of the Sun’ this is an album full of California sunshine and open space, but this time Hatchback ventures further afield, crafting a widescreen epic that travels deep into a territory once considered off limits… the new age.

Could it really be that a new age of new age is upon us? You can find it in the melodic arpeggios and beatless vistas of acts like Oneohtrix Point Never and Emeralds, and entrenched in the vibes of further out leftfield acts like James Ferraro and Ducktails. Although resuscitating out-of-bounds areas of the record shop has become something of a hipster calling card (witness the revivals of folk and disco), Hatchback has had a lifelong appreciation for the genre, stemming from summer nights listening to public radio’s Music From The Hearts Of Space and years spent scouring without irony the $1 new age bins for synthesizer-based artists. While he, like the rest of us, suffered through the dark time when Windham Hill’s particular brand of antiseptic piano wash soured us all on the concept of new age music, Sam never lost interest in the genre’s foundations – the experiments of Vangelis, Cluster, Michael Rother, Brian Eno, Harold Budd, Iasos, Popol Vuh, Klaus Schulze, and Tangerine Dream. ‘Zeus & Apollo’ pays tribute to those ‘gods’ of new age, while stepping boldly into the 21st century.

Beautifully constructed and produced, the intricate layers and melodious tones will send you spinning effortlessly out into the galaxy. Find yourself a piece of sky, put on your headphones and let Hatchback take your mind in hand— once again space travel is affordable to all.