When the crashing waves of ecstatic sound from Extra Wow wash over, it may be more tempting to visualize a radiating sun falling past a vast oceanic horizon – rather than the robust, unending foliage of America’s Pacific Northwest. However, to truly explore the layers of distortion, rhythm and electronic shamanism within, it’s paramount to return to the home of those channeling it.

“Portland is an amazing city and a great place to have a band. We have lived here for almost ten years and the music scene has just been growing and changing the whole time. It was much smaller and weirder when we first moved here, with fewer bands and venues and a lot more freaky punk, noise and experimental psychedelic stuff, but lots of new bands have moved here and new clubs have opened and the scene just keeps evolving as time goes on.”

Nice Nice are from Portland, Oregon. Jason Buehler and Mark Shirazi have been using their guitars, drums, voices, electronics and lots of other stuff to create their “post-everything modern music” for nearly a decade. By playing countless kinetic live shows around the US, they’ve honed their unorthodox craft.

Beholding the sonic leviathan that is a Nice Nice live experience can leave an observer dazed. They build complex loops in real time, constructing, sculpting, bending and fragmenting their songs without warning - a process that ensures consistently unique performances and potentially thrilling mistakes. Not only engaging for the audience, the band exhibit a very specific link to each other, having developed near-telepathic abilities allowing them to anticipate each other’s next action at any moment.

"The best live band in the world took a sabbatical of sorts in 2007, sequestering themselves in the studio to document their frenetically poly rhythmic, drums 'n' guitar-based electro-psychedelia—equal parts safari and Atari—for new label Warp Records. If this album captures even a fraction of the ferocity, nuance, and playfulness that Nice Nice display on stage, Warp ought to have a world beater on its hands." Portland Mercury Paper




Extra Wow is an extremely apt title for an album that presents itself as a constantly unfolding collection of kaleidoscopic musical sediments. Each song effectively builds on the one before it to create the effect of an album-length crescendo that encompasses everything from forward-reaching psychedelia and neo-primitive electronic experiments to dub rhythms and learned lessons from the pillars of krautrock. From the acid-punk opening of One Hit it’s apparent that establishing your equilibrium within the world of Nice Nice will not be easy.

When talking of their influences, they say “We have listened to and played a lot of noisy/experimental music and rhythmic/tribal music and komische/motorik influenced music but, honestly, we have listened to and tried to play just about every style of music that we have come across. We are complete musical omnivores and love a really wide range of styles and sounds without shame- too much music to possibly list.”

With precision motorik propulsion and synesthesistic textures, tracks like Everything Falling Apart and A Vibration drive Extra Wow along at a pace that demands a commitment from the listener. A rewarding and mind bending journey, this album should be the first step in building a legion of fans for these future heroes.


** ** **

Quotes from last single release “One Hit”:

“ every so often I like it when a certain piece of music is, well, so loud and thrillingly jolting that it literally feels like it’s beating me round the chops…so to wake up to the aptly titles ‘One Hit in my inbox this morning was really a rather lovely surprise” – NME.com

“Already known in their locale of Portland, Oregon as one of the hottest bands on the circuit, Warp has now signed up this duo” – Artrocker, Nov 09

“a rhythmic exercise in beats, loops, and swirling synths, complete with a few chanted vocals, tinkling keyboards, and a vaguely Gang Gang Dance-like aftertaste.” - Pitchfork