Lunar Isles announces 4th studio album
Over a long run of time, people do indeed change, often quite dramatically. Some take up new hobbies, others change their appearance — most are doing totally different things than they were a decade prior.
For Seoul-based independent recording artist David Skimming, who nowadays works under the moniker Lunar Isles, this would definitely be the scenario versus what he was doing back in Scotland 10 years ago. He was indeed making indie music even then with another band, but he was still near home in Glasgow and this first band was taking cues from the likes of Talking Heads, Foals and Radiohead for their sound.
Fast-forward a decade, and Skimming is now making some of the best guitar-centric dreamscapes out there from his adopted home base in Korea, taking cues from the likes of Khruangbin and Mac DeMarco with his new sound. But traces of the past can still be sensed, as whiffs of David Byrne and Thom Yorke can still be caught here and there.
Feb. 22 saw the release of Skimming’s latest solo single, titled “Dissolve,” a perfect example of “his surf-tinged bedroom pop” style. With it came the announcement a new album, titled “Parasol,” which will drop later this year in June. This latest long player will be the fourth that Lunar Isles has dropped since his 2021 debut LP, “Tides.”
The new single, Skimming told The Korea Times, “centers around the theme of devotion and how you lose and find a bit of yourself when you devote yourself to someone or something.”
While Parasol is only tentatively planned for release in June, it is perfectly titled for the summer months on the horizon, which we’re all dreaming of this dreary yet hopeful time of year.
“The plan is to release a single each month until (Parasol comes out),” he said. “It’s very much a summer album, with the idea of it being something you listen to while you’re chilling outside with a beer in the sun or on a drive along the coast.”
While four albums in a shade under three years’ time is impressive on its own, that doesn’t explicitly count the numerous EPs that have also dropped within this rather frantic yet somehow controlled window of creation. One of these shorter albums is “Atlas,” out in full right after the calendar flipped to 2024.
This type of prolific, voluminous and high-quality output was not always so. In fact, Skimming spent many of his first years here in the Land of Morning Calm not doing anything musically.
What was the reason for such an extended sabbatical after arrival?
“I think a big part of it was just needing the time to adapt to a new culture, new job and making new friends. There was also a sense of temporariness at first, not really knowing if I would stay for another year, which makes it hard to commit to starting or joining bands,” Skimming explained.
Once he got the ball rolling with “Tides,” the title track to his debut LP, as Lunar Isles, he said, “It was actually a lot smoother than I was expecting it to be but there were definitely some points of frustration. Programming drum sounds was the hardest part for me personally to get the hang of, so I had to spend a bit of time working on that along with the mastering/mixing side of things once I decided to approach things a bit more seriously.”
One would be hard-pressed to find even a slight trace of frustration or amateurism on these releases, though. The dynamic sound quality and professional nature of each Lunar Isles release proves itself with some of the amazing tastemaker support Skimming has received as momentum has built these past few years.
“It’s fair to say I’ve been completely blown away by the support since I started releasing music. I honestly thought I would just be making the music for myself and if anyone else liked it would be a bonus,” Skimming explained. “I knew my mates and my mum would listen to it but didn’t really have any sort of expectation in terms of streams or anything.”
“Parasol” is tentatively scheduled for release in June, with more teaser singles scheduled for March, April and May.
For more from Lunar Isles, you can listen at lunarisles.bandcamp. com or follow him on Instagram @ lunarisles_ or get a lot more links at linktr.ee/lunarisles.