Prophecy Production has signed Duncan Patterson's ALTERNATIVE 4.

Patterson is an icon of melancholic alternative rock music. With his crucial songwriting role on ANATHEMA's Eternity and Alternative 4 he freed the Liverpool doomsters of their tight metal corset, he founded the likewise renowned ANTIMATTER whose first albums he shaped significantly, and he explored ethereal melancholia on two Ion albums thus far.

Alternative 4 is Patterson's latest brainchild. With the band name derived from the eponymous Anathema album from 1998, the musical and atmospheric direction of this band is given: a solid rock foundation enriched with painful piano and string arrangements, sometimes on the verge of ambient music, sometimes offering the big influence of the rather dark and abysmal side of PINK FLOYD. All this can already be witnessed on last year's debut album The Brink and shall now be continued with further album releases on Prophecy Productions, as a long-term contract between the label and Alternative 4 has been concluded.

Duncan Patterson on the new cooperation: "It's good to be back onboard a label who have always had respect for my work, regardless of how obscure or 'uncommercial' it often turns out. In todays musical climate it is difficult to find a decent label who are genuinely focused more on the artistic/innovative side than anything else. For me that is essential as I've no plans to start playing and writing fashionable music as a career move, not unless I do it accidentally that is."

Alternative 4 are already working on the successor of The Brink. The upcoming album will be entitled The Obscurants and will probably be recorded in late 2012.

Listen to Alternative 4 tracks, 'False Light' and 'Automata' - both featured on The Brink, below:

More on Alternative 4 at this location.