RENDLESHAM by A FAREWELL TO HEXES
I’m delighted to announce the vinyl version of the ‘Rendlesham’ will be released very soon (mid-July) on the sublime Polytechnic Youth label. The album got a limited release late 2021 on an 80-copy cassette by TDO Cassettes (The Dark Outside), which sold out in less than an hour.
The vinyl version has been mastered in Denmark by Antony Ryan at RedRedPaw, with brand new sleeve art and inserts.
THE STORY
SUFFOLK, ENGLAND, 1980: Often called England’s most famous UFO case or “The British Roswell”, the Rendlesham Forest Incident actually involves two different UFO events in the woods by RAF Woodbridge Air Base, being used by the United States Air Force at the time. On the night of Dec 25-26th 1980, guards at the East Gate of the base saw lights dropping from the sky into the forest to the east. Believing it was a plane crash, guards went to investigate but to their amazement ended up chasing a large, triangular, glowing object with a pulsating red light on top and a bank of blue lights underneath which manoeuvred through the woods and later disappeared into the air. Animals in the woods and on a nearby farm went into a frenzy. Witness Sgt. James Penniston stated he managed to walk up to and around the object and even touched it at one point.
Two nights later, with the base buzzing with talk of what had apparently happened, Deputy base commander Lt. Col. Charles Halt assembled a team of airmen to investigate, Halt being determined to put an end to what he thought were nonsensical UFO rumours. Instead Halt and his men ran straight into a hive of strange activity, encountering a “red sun-like light” resembling an eye that moved about and pulsed. It then divided into five separate white objects and disappeared. Soon afterwards, they noticed 3 star-like objects manoeuvring in the sky, one occasionally beaming down a stream of light. Ground traces were also found at the landing site, including depressions in the ground, damage to the trees and increased radiation levels (up to 10 times over background) with maximum radiation being in the ground depressions and tree damaged areas.
THE ALBUM
RENDLESHAM is an electronic instrumental album soundtracking arguably Britain’s most remarkable UFO events. Side 1 soundtracks the bizarre Christmas/Boxing Day case (which includes Sergeant Jim Penniston encountering and receiving a binary code from a “craft of unknown origin”), and Side 2 brings to life the curious events witnessed by Lt. Colonel Charles Halt and his team in the forest in the early hours of 28th December 1980, incorporating original micro-cassette recordings (‘The Halt Tape’) captured at the time. The album ends with ‘Aftermath’, featuring the voice of Attorney Patrick Frascogna speaking at a 2011 U.S. court hearing attempting to gain access to Penniston & colleague John Burroughs medical records (both airmen suffered life-threatening ailments after coming into contact with the “craft” in 1980).
The music on the album is intentionally redolent of British underground electronic music at the time of the Rendlesham Forest incident. For best results this album should be listened to in the dark with eyes closed. You will enter the forest…
THE ARTIST
A FAREWELL TO HEXES is one of the pseudonym/pside projects of Adam Leonard who has quietly – and noisily – tinkered at the edges of eccentric English folk, electronic music, and more recently garage artrock with Invaderband, issuing a plethora of original music to much critical acclaim via highly regarded boutique labels such as The Great Pop Supplement, Northwestern Recordings, Tectona Grandis, Polytechnic Youth, Castles In Space, Bibliotapes and TDO Cassettes on formats including 7” vinyl, 10” vinyl, 12” vinyl, cassette & compact disc. Despite maintaining a low profile, Leonard’s Invaderband album was nominated for the 2017 Northern Ireland Music Prize alongside The Divine Comedy, Hanna Peel etc, and has garnered praise from BBC Radio 6Music’s Steve Lamacq and Gideon Coe with repeat plays on their national radio shows.
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PY160 | Stereo LP | 2022 | http://www.polytechnicyouth.com
The Message Tapes 