What with the slew of 90s indie/rock albums getting a reissue in recent years, it seems we’ve had to wait a long time for Mercury Rev‘s excellent 1998 album Deserter’s Songs to get the updating and reappraisal it deserves.
The wait is over, however, with Pitchfork revealing that Deserter’s Songs will be reissued on May 16 in the States via V2/Co-operative. The album will be released as an expanded double-CD with a second disc containing demos, rarities, B-side and outtakes.
Soon, Mercury Rev will embark on a lengthy European tour that will see them playing Deserter’s Songs in its entirety, including an appearance at Barcelona’s Primavera Sound Festival.
Mercury Rev came along with Deserter’s Songs, their fourth album, at the same time the Flaming Lips were getting famous on the back of that same whimsical yet rather dark form of modern psychedelia. As Pitchfork notes, Mercury Rev frontman Jonathan Donahue was guitarist in the Flaming Lips for three years.
Deserter’s Songs was arguably the commercial and critical high watermark for the band, who formed in Buffalo, New York in 1989. Their latest albums came in 2008 when the instrumental LP Strange Attractor came out as mp3 download only, alongside Snowflake Midnight, released as normal.
