Velocity Girl’s ¡Simpatico! (Remastered and Expanded) Out On CD/LP/All DSPs Fri. Feb. 13th, 2026 + Hear "Your Silent Face (New Order Cover)"
The classic 1994 sophomore album by indie-rock hitmakers Velocity Girl, newly remastered and back in print, with a bonus album compiling singles and rarities from the ¡Simpatico! era.
On Friday, February 13th, 2026, Sub Pop will release Velocity Girl’s¡Simpatico! (Remastered and Expanded), a new reissue of the long out-of-print 1994 sophomore album by the beloved indie-rock band, a few months ahead of its 32nd Anniversary.
On¡Simpatico! (Remastered and Expanded),the album gets an overdue sonic refresh with mastering by Golden, updated artwork byEd Fotheringham, and a treasure trove of bonus tracks from the¡Simpatico!era. Today, you can hear the band’s cover of New Order’s“Your Silent Face (2025 Remaster)”from the bonus material associated with the release.
Velocity Girl’s¡Simpatico! (Remastered and Expanded)will be available on CD/2xLP/DSPs from Sub Pop. LP preorders in North America at theSub Pop Mega Mart, in the UK and Europe atMega Mart 2, and atyour local record storewill receive the limited Loser edition on opaque jade blue and opaque violet vinyl (North America), or petrol and magenta vinyl (UK/EU). (All vinyl colors whilst stock lasts!)
Velocity Girl formed in 1989 or so at the University of Maryland outside Washington, DC with guitarist Archie Moore (Black Tambourine), guitarist Brian Nelson (Black Tambourine), drummer Jim Spellman (Starry Eyes, Foxhall Stacks, High Back Chairs, Julie Ocean, Piper Club), bassist Kelly Riles (Starry Eyes), and singer Sarah Shannon (Starry Eyes, The Not Its). The band combined English-inspired noisy shoegaze fuzz with scrappy US indie rock and classic ‘60s-style pop songwriting. A killer single on Slumberland and non-stop touring grabbed the attention of the indie-rock cognoscenti, and soon after Velocity Girl signed a contract with Sub Pop on a car hood in Hoboken, New Jersey.
After touring in support of their 1993 debut,Copacetic, the band spent the better part of a year coming up with a batch of songs for a second album. They had never worked that way before – having focused time, and a budget (from a label!), to make an album that wasn’t a self-produced, punk-rock studio thing was a fresh experience. After playing their new material for months in the noisy style of Copacetic, the band found themselves excited about the tunes, but trying to move away from the scrappy, amateur vibe of their previous records. And their influences were a bit different this time around: less My Bloody Valentine and Wedding Present, more New Order.
Somebody at Sub Pop connected the band with John Porter, the one-time Roxy Music member who had produced The Smiths, Billy Bragg, The Alarm, and a bunch of other 80’s stuff. They met up on a tour stop in Los Angeles, at a Hamburger Hamlet. He agreed to produce the album in a three-week session at Cue Studios in Falls Church, VA. He was exactly what the band needed: an editor, arranger, and taskmaster. As he mercilessly excised every unnecessarily repeated bar, the band realized they’d gravitated to a sound with cleaner lines, and almost entirely ditched the noisy guitar, no doubt influenced by Porter’s presence. Velocity Girl was extremely happy with the results, and¡Simpatico!came out in June of 1994.
This expanded reissue adds eight songs recorded at Inner Ear Studios in Arlington, VA, a few months after the album sessions. These sessions provided playfully experimental B-sides to the album’s singles, two cover songs (the New Order cover “Your Silent Face,” and a Beach Boys cover) for a single on Merge Records, and a compilation track.
Upon¡Simpatico!’s release,Rolling Stonegave the album a 4-star review, and said,“The very first guitar shriek on Simpatico! slices through any residue left over from the hazierCopacetic, revealing crisp, gleaming pop. On the new album, Velocity Girl add vocal harmonies, courtesy of guitarist Archie Moore, who joins singer Sarah Shannon on several tracks, thickening the weave of spinning guitars and cursive rhythms. As on Copacetic, the textures are heaped on, but the musical lines are less runny, the riffs are sharpened, the hooks grab tighter, and the vocals skate out front. With the help of producer John Porter (Roxy Music, the Smiths – bands famed for their own brand of alterna-sheen), the group manages to mop up the garage-band spills to reveal simple melodic constructions without washing away the music's defining layers. This record should help Velocity Girl transcend the Lush and My Bloody Valentine comparisons that flogged them afterCopacetic.”
Velocity Girl
¡Simpatico! (Remastered and Expanded)
Album Art Download
1. Sorry Again (2025 Remaster)
2. There’s Only One Thing Left To Say (2025 Remaster)
3. Tripping Wires (2025 Remaster)
4. I Can't Stop Smiling (2025 Remaster)
5. The All-Consumer (2025 Remaster)
6. Drug Girls (2025 Remaster)
7. Rubble (2025 Remaster)
8. Labrador (2025 Remaster)
9. Hey You, Get Off My Moon (2025 Remaster)
10. Medio Core (2025 Remaster)
11. What You Left Behind (2025 Remaster)
12. Wake Up, I'm Leaving (2025 Remaster)
13. Marzipan - from Sorry Again EP (2025 Remaster)
14. Labrador (Drum Machine Version) - from Sorry Again EP
(2025 Remaster)
15. Diamond Jubilee - from Sorry Again EP (2025 Remaster)
16. What You Left Behind (Reprise) - from Echoes of the Nation's Capitol #2 compilation (2025 Remaster)
17. Your Silent Face - from Your Silent Face single (2025 Remaster)
18. You're So Good to Me - from Your Silent Face single (2025 Remaster)
19. Seven Seas - from Seven Seas single (2025 Remaster)
20. Breaking Lines - from Seven Seas single (2025 Remaster)
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