WL//WH Premiere: CLOUD STUDIES Endure the Elements Without Losing Hope “Cloud Cartography”

Photo by Alison Ahern

‘Cloud Cartography’ was the first song written by Adam for the band as a means to set the direction for their sonic explorations. It was inspired by visits to the Derryveagh Mountains of Donegal in Ireland, and fighting off the elements as sheets of rain beat down upon the landscape.

WL//WH welcomes Cloud Studies, the South/East London-based Goth-Gaze newcomer four-piece made of Adam Cresswell (vocals, bass), Nat Guest (drums), Martin J Langthorne (guitars), and Adrian Taylor (guitars) to the blog for a premiere of the second single “Cloud Cartography”, the follow-up to last year’s debut single “Ghosts,” slated for release on March 14, 2025 via Happy Robots Records.

Formed in 2024, as a means for Adam Cresswell and Martin J Langthorne to explore the sonic possibilities offered by their large arsenal of effects pedals, the band fuses a panoramic and slippery full-spectrum 90s Shoegazing wall of sound, pushy tight Kraut rhythms, droning Velvets guitar riffs and introspective, mellifluous Galaxie 500-like vocal tones to create an ecstatic sidereal state of trance.

The song is about trying to make sense of a constantly changing world and our efforts to document and understand it. In a library, the protagonist meets someone attempting to map the clouds. They find themselves standing on a mountainside battling the elements, their undaunted optimism constantly challenged by the impossible nature of their task.

“Cloud Cartography” relentlessly pulses on shuffling drum beats and moody throbbing bass lines as a steady flowing backdrop for lush fizzing and shimmering sheets of reverb-drenched guitars, alongside fluid skyrocketing synths, obsessively ring and wash over gloomy yet hopeful, layered, smooth vocals, deeply radiating into a multicoloured, jolting and rolling finale, as if to reawaken the listener wrapped in a boundless cathartic melancholy.

Cloud Studies‘ sophomore single, “Cloud Cartography”, is due to be released on March 14, 2025 via Happy Robots Records.

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