The Pains of Being Pure At Heart shares new video for classic track "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan" & announces tour dates

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart shares new video for classic track "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan" & announces tour dates

VIDEO: "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan" -
YouTube

 

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart exploded out of the late 00s Brooklyn indie scene with a bright, distinctive sound that paid tribute to everything from C86 to early Slumberland, Sarah and Creation label pop, but with a distinct American flavor drawn from groups like Smashing Pumpkins and The Exploding Hearts. Their 2009 self-titled debut is rightly considered a classic and was reissued earlier this year, accompanied by the rarities compilation Perfect Right Now: A Slumberland Collection 2008 - 2010.

Next month, the band return to the UK for an extensive tour, with support from The Cords, Fear of Men and Cassie Ramone (Vivian Girls/Babies) and then in Feb. they'll do a long overdue west coast run in the US with Living Hour opening up - full dates below...

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart have also shared a new video for classic single "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan," (taken from Perfect Right Now) which combines footage taken by Shannon McMahon (My Little Underground zine, WNYU DJ) and live footage of the band playing in Nottingham in 2008. It's directed by Art Boonparn, who also directed previous videos for "Everything With You," "Young Adult Friction," "Say No to Love," "Kelly," "Anymore," and many other PAINS videos over the years.

The band's Kip Berman says of the new video: “We first met Shannon and James when we did a session at their college radio station WNYU. Afterwards, Shannon interviewed us for her zine, and we bonded over a shared love of the great new indiepop bands like Sharp Pins, Lightheaded, and Good Flying Birds (she actually turned us on to GFB). In the interview, she asked about our song Kurt Cobain's Cardigan, and I talked about how even before we wrote the song, that phrase was really a mantra to us, as we probably would have never gotten into the things we love if it wasn’t for Kurt telling all his 13 year old fans to ‘go check out The Vaselines, Beat Happening, and Teenage Fanclub’ - bands that have a pretty different sound to Nirvana, but shared a similar spirit.” So later, when we saw the super 8 footage she made with James, it felt really perfect for that song’s video."

The ten tracks on Perfect Right Now compile the much-loved (and LONG out of print!) b-sides from the 7"s that accompanied that first album, the follow-up Higher Than The Stars EP, a couple of scarce tunes from split singles, and finally "Say No To Love," a spectacular song that points the way forward to the band's next chapter. There are some proper lost classics here, songs like "Kurt Cobain's Cardigan" and "The Pains of Being Pure at Heart" that still pack the dancefloors at indie discos from Göteborg to Glasgow and we couldn't be more excited to make them available again.

We'll let Kip from the band have the last word: "Many of these songs, like those that comprised our debut record, were written in that *now* – making up in wild pop fantasy what we couldn't quite yet achieve through musical ability. But even if that *now* is now an irrevocable *then,* I still believe that there is nothing better than making music with your friends and dreaming, as our Myspace page once proclaimed, of 'being the biggest band in the world—to about 18 people.'"

Press photo (below) by Pavla Kopecna.

PURCHASE HERE

TOUR DATES

Nov. 13: Glasgow - The Hug and Pint# - SOLD OUT
Nov. 14: Liverpool - Arts Club* 
Nov. 15: Glasgow - Stereo* - SOLD OUT
Nov. 16: Manchester - Band on the Wall*
Nov. 17:  Leeds - The Old Woollen*
Nov. 18: Nottingham - Metronome*
Nov. 19: Bedford - Esquires*
Nov. 20: Bristol - Thekla*
Nov. 21: Brighton - Concorde 2*^
Nov. 22: London - The Garage* - SOLD OUT
Nov. 23: London - The Betsey Trotwood - SOLD OUT
Nov. 29: Jakarta - Joyland
Feb. 16: Seattle, WA - Vera Project %
Feb. 17: Portland, OR - Showdown %
Feb. 20: San Francisco, CA - Rickshaw Stop %
Feb. 21: Los Angeles, CA - Echoplex %

# = w/ The Cords
^ = w/ Fear of Men
*= w/ Cassie Ramone (Vivian Girls, The Babies)
% = w/ Living Hour