Last Dinner Party, The: Prelude To Ecstacy (Vinyl LP)

Without doubt Last Dinner Party will be the sound of 2024. Their debut album Prelude To Ecstasy is released via Island Records. It was produced by James Ford in London, and features the breakthrough singles, “Nothing Matters”, “Sinner”, and “My Lady Of Mercy”.

At the turn of 2023, The Last Dinner Party was little more than a new name being shared amongst those that had caught them live. Great songs, strong aesthetic. Having spent much of 2022 writing those songs, road-testing them, and then taking them into the studio, it wasn’t until April when the band released the instantly more-ish, dark guitar-pop of 'Nothing Matters' that seemingly everyone had now formed an opinion on them. It was an introduction that took the online world by storm, and yet behind all the excitement and narrative was a fantastically confident indie-rock song by a band doing it the old-fashioned way, out on the road.

Third single, 'My Lady Of Mercy', an almost gothic, haunting rock song, and now with this atmospheric and anthemic ballad, 'On Your Side', the band’s songwriting is testament to all the buzz and excitement already accumulated. As it should be. Rather than wilt under the spotlight, they’ve arguably become a tighter, stronger unit because of it.

"Prelude to Ecstasy is a pendulum which swings between the extremes of human emotion, from the ecstasy of passion to the sublimity of pain, and it is this concept which binds our album together. This is an archeology of ourselves; you can exhume our collective and individual experiences and influences from within its fabric. We exorcised guitars for their solos, laid bare confessions directly from diary pages, and summoned an orchestra to bring our vision to life. It is our greatest honour and pride to present this offering to the world, it is everything we are."

Prelude To Ecstasy is both the closing of that introductory chapter and the opening of the next. The Last Dinner Party? Believe the hype.

Black vinyl version.

1. Prelude To Ecstasy
   
2. Burn Alive
   
3. Caesar on a TV Screen
   
4. The Feminine Urge
   
5. On Your Side
   
6. Beautiful Boy
   
7. Gjuha
   
8. Sinner
   
9. My Lady of Mercy
   
10. Portrait of a Dead Girl
    
11. Nothing Matters
    
12. Mirror