Many of the members of Glasgow's seven-piece all-girl collective Muscles of Joy met through doing time in the Parsonage, an enormous indie choir led by Janis Murray, whose repertoire includes choral re-envisionings of songs by Joy Division and Gram Parsons, among others. The bandmembers include Leigh Ferguson, Vikki Morton, Esther Congreave, Anne-Marie Copestake, Ariki Porteous, Katy Dove, and Jenny O’Boyle, some of whom have previously collaborated outside of the band on independent films or visual art. The collective plays on some of their choral experience with compositions heavy on group vocals. Members of the group also play instruments of their own making, employed alongside more traditional rock instruments. This atypical pastiche creates a sound equal parts eerie and beautiful, earning the group comparisons to primitive proto-punk acts like the Raincoats and the Slits, as well as to the fractured storytelling and found-sound collages of lesser-known indie acts like the Shadow Ring and Boredoms offshoot OOIOO. Their self-titled debut album arrived in the fall of 2011, landing the group on many year-end best-of lists, including a proclamation from esteemed British rock critic Everett True that Muscles of Joy were the greatest band of the year. The group's first appearances in the U.S. were slated for early 2012.