Whirl - Distressor

Whirl is a shoegaze band from Northern California that caught my attention sometime last year when I ordered their 2 song demo tape. They have since recorded this 7 song EP that is a huge step up from the demo which was already awesome. 'Leave' was the track on the demo that really peaked my interest and the album version is infinitely better. My only complaint about the demo was how poor the quality was.. the recording was already pretty fuzzy and scratchy and that, on top of it being a cassette with all the added hiss, made the already fuzzy shoegaze sound pretty muddled. This is a much better balance. 
I know you're probably thinking.. "ughh another shoegaze band, cool.." but really, try not to be dissuaded by the sudden influx of shoegazey type bands that have recently come about. Whirl definitely has a very straight up, quintessential shoegaze sound, but they do it so well. Hypnotizing noisy distortion and echoey female vocals.. you can't go wrong.
Buy the tape at http://www.bridgetownrecords.info/
Oh and Nicole Kidman is naked on the cover. 

Track1 - Preface
Track2 - Leave
Track3 - Blue
Track4 - Ghost
Track5 - Meaningless
Track6 - Child
Track7 - Sandy