Alberteen - Miss World is the app to accompany the album of the same name, released worldwide digitally, on CD and vinyl on 25th May 2015 via the bands label Rhythm & Noir. It features, music, images, lyrics and descriptions relating to the album as well as a biography of the band. This app guides the viewer through a virtual map of the album and south-east coast, soundtracked by the relevant ‘Miss World’ album track and artworked with individual location photographs by Kent artist Nigel Green.
In 2012 Alberteen released their debut ‘Metal Book’ which mixed 60s R ‘n’ B, dark, provocative lyricism and post-punk sonics into their own distinctive blend of ‘Rhythm & Noir’. The album got rave reviews, with both Uncut and The Independent giving it 4 stars, while the album’s single, ‘A Girl And A Gun’ was playlisted on BBC 6 Music and featured as one of their ‘Tracks of the Year’, championed by a host of DJs including Mark Radcliffe & Stuart Maconie, Gideon Coe, Liz Kershaw and Tom Robinson; all accumulating in Alberteen being invited into the studio to record a BBC6 Music session. The following year, the track was remixed by Cornershop and put out as the last ever release on their acclaimed Singhles Club series.
Miss World was produced by Mike Bennett (The Fall, Ian Brown. The album is one of a theme, taking the listener around the landscapes and histories of the South-east coast, from the looming presence of Dungeness’ nuclear power station to the Margate mod riots of ’64 through to the MOD research site at Fort Halstead - via the many half-forgotten seaside towns in-between. ‘Miss World’ takes inspiration from the coast’s landscape, history and artistic heritage, including J.M.W Turner’s painting ‘Snow Storm – Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth’, the works of T.S. Eliott and the 17th-Century sonnet of John Donne inscribed on Derek Jarman’s Dungeness cottage. Even the album’s title, ‘Miss World’ is a nod to Folkestone’s role in hosting the first international beauty contest in 1908 and to Derek Jarman’s film of the same name, while the album’s cover is a photograph of vintage nuclear equipment from Dungeness’ power station (taken by Kent-based photographer Nigel Green).