When White Lies asked Violens (pronounced 'vy-lenz') to join them on their November tour, Violens started thinking about creating something special to take to the UK with them. Having recently worked on remixes for numerous other bands who would in turn remix Violens, the New York band decided to collate these remixes with new tracks they have been playing at US shows. The result is their excellent Winter Mixtape which is available free at www.violens.net - the mixtape is a great way to understand all the influences and styles that inspire Violens' songwriting and is also a showcase for some great songs.

The Winter Mixtape features special tracks including remixes and covers of White Lies, Wire, MGMT, The Byrds, Caroline Polachek (Chairlift), Saint Etienne and My Bloody Valentine amongst unreleased songs by Violens. Lead singer of Violens Jorge Elbrecht says of the project; "a mixtape seemed like a really exciting vehicle for this stuff, especially if there was a way to incorporate other music that has informed or inspired Violens all this time".

The material sampled or rearranged for the mixtape presents an introduction of where Violens' influences stem from. Speaking of their innovative remix of The Byrds 'I See You' where the four piece add their own guitars plus vocals from My Bloody Valentine, Jorge adds; "as a songwriter/producer it feels just as gut-wrong as it does liberating and fresh to take a recording you love and try to join a new voice in with it, alter the structure, or twist it into something else all together". The mixtape shows, in Jorge, a songwriter and producer who is willing to push the boundaries of rock music to wonderful results.

Violens will be releasing their next single in February next year, the brand new track 'Until it's Unlit'. Catch them this week when they return to London for a few select shows before joining White Lies on their full UK tour.