Supposedly named after Vesta, the brightest asteroid in our solar system, the moniker is an obvious nod to Spacemen 3, the classic UK band which The Asteroid #4 repeatedly cite as an influence. In fact, one of the group’s earliest recorded offerings was an even spacier (if that’s possible) version of Losing Touch With My Mind on Rocket Girl’s tribute compilation to the psych giants. Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember himself named the song as a stand-out track on that compilation in an interview with Magnet Magazine.

Now The Asteroid #4 is ready to release what will be their 6th full-length album. This collection of albums, accompanied by a host of compilation selections, digital-only rarities and a number of 7″ singles, is all the more impressive considering the revolving cast of band members over the years. True, The Asteriod #4 have maintained a few core members but watched countless others come and go. Despite this challenge in continuity, the band has never called it quits. If truth be told, perhaps it has been the near-constant change in personnel over the last decade or so that’s made the band what it is today. Their sound, a hypnotic hybrid of several different genres filtered through the kaleidoscope of all things psych, krautrock, shoegaze, folk and even 70s ‘cosmic’ country-rock, has matured them to the point of originality rather than simply homage.

Perhaps due to the season, and its affect on the psyche, new album Hail To The Clear Figurines has a touch of melancholy, a wistfulness borne of the blown snow and bare trees enveloping their surroundings. A willing back to life of all that was slumbering. From the opening invitation to “take the journey like we’re lovers,” on Wicked Wire, the apocalypse history of the title track, the shambolic Buffalo Springfield-alike of The Unknown and the Byrdsian Got Nowhere To Go to the closing thrust and majesty of Ignition Slated For Eight, The Asteroid #4 have given us an album to treasure.

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Download The Asteroid #4 – Ignition Slated For Eight mp3 (from Hail To The Clear Figurines)