James VillaManchester Orchestra’s new album, COPE (Loma Vista), sold 18,093 copies in its first week, entering the Billboard Top 200 at #13, and hit #1 on the iTunes Alternative Charts giving the Atlanta rock quintet the highest debut of its career and its largest sales week ever. COPE is also top 20 in 40 markets across the country, revealing the broad support of Manchester Orchestra’s fervent fanbase nationwide.
The media has also shown tremendous support. The band kicked off release week with an appearance, performing the title track on the Late Show with David Letterman, and Pitchfork noted that COPE contains “11 bullshit-free rock songs.” Alternative Press enthused in its four-star review, “It’s the band’s signature sound, only beefed up with massive choruses, heavy plowing and pleasing anguish, plenty of fuzz and Built To Spill-nodding voical/guitar oscillations, some dizzying In The Aeroplane Over The Sea-ish noise and even stoner metal, hiding subtle complexities within its deceptive simplicity,” while Absolute Punk, hailed, “So what we end up with on COPE is not only an album that’s worth the wait, but one that seems to be pretty distinctly illuminating a path: soft-to-loud, simplicity over complexity and emotional release through power chords.”
COPE was self-produced alongside Manchester Orchestra’s long-time collaborating partner Dan Hannon, and mixed by John Agnello at Fluxivity Studios in Brooklyn. They recorded the entire record in the home studio they built themselves after six months spent gutting and refurbishing the old house they used to live in together. The follow up to 2011’s Simple Math, the band’s critically acclaimed and highest charting album to date, COPE is an unrelenting and unapologetically heavy 38 minutes of rock.
After several months of writing and recording between June 2012 and March 2013, Hull along with the rest of the band – lead guitarist Robert McDowell, keyboardist/percussionist Chris Freeman, bassist Andy Prince and drummer Tim Very – were forced to pair down the 28 or so completed songs in order to round out the album that would become COPE, leaving a collection of songs that is refreshingly direct and succinct in nature.
Manchester Orchestra has already begun touring North America and the UK in support of COPE, and will continue to do so throughout the year, including an appearance at Lollapalooza. Upcoming tour dates are listed below.
APRIL
10 – London, UK – Scala
11 – Manchester, UK – Club Academy SOLD OUT
12 -Glasgow, UK – SWG3 SOLD OUT
17 – Tampa, FL – The Ritz
18 – Ft. Lauderdale, FL – Revolution
19 – Orlando, FL – House of Blues Orlando
21 – Houston, TX – House of Blues Houston
22 – Austin, TX – Emo’s
23 – Dallas, TX – House of Blues Dallas
24 – Lawrence, KS – Granada
25 – Denver, CO – Summit Music Hall
26 – Salt Lake City, UT – In The Venue
28 – Spokane, WA – Knitting Factory
29 – Seattle, WA – Neptune
30 – Portland, OR – Roseland Ballroom
MAY
02 – San Francisco, CA – The Fillmore SOLD OUT
03 – Los Angeles, CA – House of Blues Los Angeles SOLD OUT
04 – Anaheim, CA – House of Blues Anaheim SOLD OUT
06 – San Diego, CA – House of Blues San Diego
07 – Tempe, AZ – Marquee
09 – Colorado Springs, CO – Black Sheep
10 – Omaha, NE – Sokol
11 – St. Louis, MO – The Pageant
12 – Madison, WI – Majestic
14 – Minneapolis, MN – Skyway
15 – Chicago, IL – HOB Chicago SOLD OUT
16 – Grand Rapids, MI – Intersection
17 – Cincinnati, OH – Bogart’s
19 – Toronto, ON – Opera House SOLD OUT
20 – Buffalo, NY – Town Ballroom
22 – New York, NY – Terminal 5
23 – Boston, MA – House of Blues Boston
24 – Philadelphia, PA – Theatre of The Living Arts SOLD OUT
25 – Philadelphia, PA – Theatre of The Living Arts
27 – Silver Spring, MD – The Fillmore Silver Spring
28 – Norfolk, VA – Norva
29 – Charlotte, NC – The Fillmore Charlotte
30 – Atlanta, GA – Tabernacle
31 – Nashville, TN – Cannery
Tim Schumann
