Blackpool Astronomy

Started as side project by Jeff McCollough, a former founding member of 1990’s Seattle shoegaze band Lapis. In 1998 the project took a backseat to several other endeavors. After a year Jeff had literally worked on over 25 recordings. He would work long into the night using various vintage technologies to create the sonic atmospheres. After a couple large and painful events he got back to work crafting sonic mayhem and he started to piece together the kind of sonic patchwork he wanted. He added the skills of Ben Madonna on the drums, making Blackpool Astronomy a band instead of a solo project. The sound started to veer towards more of a gothic shoegaze with a heavy psych bent. They dumped all the material from the first record to write a new set of songs, and in January 2014 they went into studio and created “Tripping the Mortal Coil,” which was a collection of songs inspired by the events around them, including a tragic loss of Jeff’s father to cancer and the grief he was feeling. This record had a much more open sound, which has gotten high praise from radio stations, critics and fans. Kimberly Rizk of Below Blackstar joined for a couple shows, then had to leave due to medical issues. The band continued to play shows with good friend and Furniture Girls drummer Thane Mitchell, even recording an acclaimed cover of Lush’s “Scarlet” with him before his departure in early March, for the TBTCI Records tribute compilation “Love Life.” In late March of 2018, drummer Joe Jarvis of Sleepwell Citizen joined the band. 2018 was full of festivals, recording and changes, as planned; the new record “The Secret Language of a Nervous Breakdown” came out in the summer of 2019 on Blew // Rose (North America), TBTCI Records (worldwide), and we are glad everyone can finally hear it. We worked really hard on this, so we are very proud of this release. The fall will be full of music with the release of our 3rd record “Lifeless,” which was recorded during the pandemic and has a very interesting story of its own.