(PR) On April 14, 2009 Metric will release their fourth full length studio album, Fantasies in the United States and Canada. Fans will be able to pre-order the record directly from the band starting March 2, 2009 at www.ilovemetric.com in one of several possible product configurations.
Fans who pre-order the album will immediately get an MP3 of the album's first single, "Help I'm Alive" plus bonus materials exclusive to the pre-order.
Metric made a point of taking their time with the writing process on the new album and many of the songs were road tested between recording sessions. Says guitarist Jimmy Shaw, "We allowed this record to dictate its own process. Whatever that process was going to be, it was going to be, we were relaxed about it. The whole time I could hear the sound I wanted in my head -really big and really dreamy." Produced by Gavin Brown and Jimmy Shaw and mixed by Grammy nominated, long time friend and collaborator John O'Mahony (Coldplay, The Strokes), the album's gilded surfaces and textural density - a mix of psychedelia, disco, electronica, punk-rock and bubblegum pop - manifest Shaw's "dream state" vision.
The band is excited about exploring new ways of getting music out to their fans around the world and hope to be part of a new spirit of innovation in the music industry in that regard. "When we got out of our record deal we took meetings with all the usual suspects, the major labels and the big indies" explains METRIC frontwoman Emily Haines. "It was strange having some real choices for the first time in our career while also feeling like whichever deal we chose was going to end up being restrictive and force us to compromise creatively. At one point, we just said 'oh fuck it, lets gamble', took a deep breath and decided to put this record out worldwide our own way."
Always up for a worthwhile challenge, METRIC self-financed the recordings, set up their own global label operation and assembled a team to release the new album in major territories around the world. "But we're not doing it totally on our own" comments guitarist Jimmy Shaw. "In Canada it's coming out with Last Gang who released Live it Out and Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? and our friends at Arts & Crafts will be releasing the album in Mexico. We've set up distribution and hired our own staff to handle releasing the record in the USA, the UK, all throughout continental Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. It's pretty insane, but it's really exciting. We might go down in flames, or it might be the best move ever. Either way it will have been on our terms, and that for us is success."
