Horse Jumper Of Love

Sometimes the best works are born when no one is paying attention. That is certainly the case with Horse Jumper of Love’s self-titled debut album: a raw and painful slowcore record, written in a basement, quietly uploaded to Bandcamp and released on cassette in 2016 by Disposable America, before receiving a wider release the following year on vinyl and streaming platforms via Run For Cover Records.

The album’s extremely modest origins may seem at odds with the considerable impact it would have. Ten years later, Horse Jumper of Love is widely regarded as an essential record of the 2010s, a major release that helped bring slowcore and shoegaze out of musical obscurity and back to the heart of the indie rock scene. Yet at the time it was created, the young band had absolutely no specific expectations.

Today, to celebrate the album's tenth anniversary, Horse Jumper of Love and Run For Cover have expanded and remastered this cult classic. This new edition notably includes a booklet of handwritten guitar tablature, archival photos, and an additional disc gathering unreleased B-sides, demos, and alternative versions. It is a carefully crafted tribute to a foundational record, as well as to the era, place, and mindset from which it emerged.

In the spring of 2016, Horse Jumper of Love — guitarist and singer Dimitri Giannopoulos, bassist John Margaris, and drummer James Doran — was a young teenage trio starting to make a name for themselves in the Boston house show circuit.

"It’s really a slacker album in that sense, a record that could only have been born out of that total lack of shame inherent to being a lowlife. It came because it had to come, because I was letting myself completely sink into mental illness and self-destruction. You create and show your art because you are burning to touch something universal, to make the world seem a little less foreign. In hindsight, it was something very pure."

This visceral need for expression runs through Horse Jumper of Love and helped them find a surprisingly loyal audience on Bandcamp, before catching the attention of the then-rising label Run For Cover, which pressed it on vinyl and further amplified its momentum.

Soon, the band's small local following expanded to forums and online communities, then to tastemaking media outlets like Stereogum, Pitchfork, and NPR. And suddenly, the band found themselves at the beginning of what would become a true professional music career.

In just a few years, Horse Jumper of Love went from Boston basements to headlining tours around the world, major festivals, and opening for bands that had influenced them, like Duster. In turn, the traces of their self-titled debut can now be heard in a new generation of bands that owe it a great debt sonically, such as They Are Gutting A Body of Water, Teethe, Shallowater, and many others.

Such rapid recognition might seem surprising for these quiet, fragile, and somewhat rough-hewn songs. Yet Horse Jumper of Love has become a modern classic: its elegiac tracks are now slowcore staples, and its hand-drawn cover art, illustrated by Giannopoulos, is immediately recognizable.

The emotion that runs through this music, as well as the way Giannopoulos sings with such deep yearning, have undeniably stood the test of time. There is a form of purity and universality in this album that feels timeless.

The thirteen bonus tracks of the 10th Anniversary Deluxe Edition — most of which were recorded by Gi