Jake Xerxes Fussell has announced a new album, When I’m Called, his first for Fat Possum, which will be out July 12. The album was produced by his longtime collaborator James Elkington, and it features contributions from Blake Mills, Joan Shelley, Robin Holcomb and more.
As on other records, Fussell is an master interpreter of other people’s songs, and the first single from the album is his version of traditional folk song “Going to Georgia.” “I learned the traditional song ‘Going to Georgia’ from a few different places so my version is something of a collage” says Fussell. “There are a number of variants out there. Ralph Stanley played a version of it, as did the great song collector and revivalist/interpreter Paul Clayton. My main source was an early 1980s field recording of The Eller Family of Hiawassee, Georgia, brought to us by artist-documentarians Art and Margo Rosenbaum via their wonderful Folkways anthology Folk Visions & Voices: Traditional Music and Song in Northern Georgia.” Listen below.
Jake will be on tour starting in May, including shows with Kath Bloom and Robin Holcomb. He plays NYC’s Le Poisson Rouge on June 27 with Bloom, and tickets for the whole tour go on sale Friday, April 19 at 10 AM local time. All dates are listed below.
When I’m Called 1. Andy 2. Cuckoo! 3. Leaving Here, Don’t Know Where I’m Going 4. Feeing Day 5. When I’m Called 6. One Morning In May 7. Gone To Hilo 8. Who Killed Poor Robin? 9. Going To Georgia
Jake Xerxes Fussell – 2024 Tour Dates Thu. May 16 – Charlotte, NC @ The Evening Muse Fri. May 17 – Asheville, NC @ The Outpost Sat. May 18 – Talbotton, GA @ Talbotton Fest Sun. May 19 – Birmingham, AL @ Saturn Fri. June 21 – Roanoke, VA @ Spot on Kirk Sat. June 22 – Richmond, VA @ Richmond Music Hall Sun. June 23 – Mt. Solon, VA @ Red Wing Roots Festival Tue. June 25 – Baltimore, MD @ Metro Gallery Thu. June 27 – New York, NY @ Le Poisson Rouge ~ Fri. June 28 – Catskill, NY @ Avalon Lounge ~ Sat. June 29 – Burlington, VT @ Higher Ground Tue. July 16 – San Diego @ The Casbah * Wed. July 17 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Barnsdall Gallery * Thu. July 18 – San Luis Obispo, CA @ Brisol’s Cider House * Fri. July 19 – Felton, CA @ Felton Music Hall * Sat. July 20 -San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel * Sun. July 21 – Sacramento, CA @ Harlow’s * Tue. July 23 – Bend, OR @ Volcanic Pub * Wed. July 24 -Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios * Thu. July 25 – Seattle, WA @ Tractor Tavern * Fri. July 26 – Bellingham, WA @ Wild Buffalo * Sat. July 27 – Vancouver, BC @ Wise Hall * Fri. Aug. 30 – London, UK @ Lafayette Sat. Aug. 31 – Lewes, UK @ Con Club Lewes nr Brighton Sun. Sept. 1 – Bristol, UK @ Lantern Hall Mon. Sept. 2 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club Tue. Sept. 3 – Glasgow, UK @ Mono Wed. Sept. 4 – Manchester, UK @ The Deaf Institute Fri. Sept. 6 – Paris, FR @ L’Archipel Sat. Sept. 7 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique Sun. Sept. 8 – Rotterdam, NL @ Kantine Walhalla Thu. Sept. 26 – Lafayette, LA @ Acadiana Center for the Arts
~ with special guest Kath Bloom * with special guest Robin Holcomb
British-Brazilan singer-songwriter Liana Flores pairs dream-like vignettes of her intimate world with wistful guitar melodies to get lost in, combining a unique and intoxicating range of stylistic influences from British folk and classic jazz to ‘60s Brazilian bossa nova.
Following the runaway global success of her self-released track ‘rises the moon’, Liana embarks on her first headline dates with her brand new band to play fresh material that she’s spent the past year perfecting.
Emotional Contracts, the latest full-length album from Deer Tick, catalogs all the existential casualties that accompany the passing of time, instilling each song with the irresistibly reckless spirit that’s defined the band for nearly two decades. Before heading into the studio with producer Dave Fridmann (The Flaming Lips, Spoon, Sleater-Kinney), the Providence-bred four-piece spent months working on demos in a perpetually flooded warehouse space in their hometown, enduring the busted heating system and massive holes in the roof as they carved out the album’s 10 raggedly eloquent tracks. Emotional Contracts fully echoes the unruly energy of its creation, ultimately making for a heavy-hearted yet wildly life-affirming portrait of growing older without losing heart.
Deer Tick’s first new body of work since 2017’s simultaneously released Deer Tick Vol. 1 and Deer Tick Vol. 2, Emotional Contracts is their most collaborative to date, and sees all four members operating at their peak songcraft powers. The album came to life over an unusually lengthy period of time for the band, with each track based in playing around together and connected in the almost telepathic way that’s only possible after nearly 20 years. Well-rehearsed and overly prepared, Deer Tick embraced a decidedly more free-and-easy approach to the recording process at Fridmann’s Tarbox Road Studios in Western New York. “We’ve had a habit of trying to maintain a strict control over everything in the studio, but this time we wanted to see what it would feel like to let go a bit,” says singer/guitarist John McCauley, whose bandmates include guitarist Ian O’Neil, drummer Dennis Ryan, and bassist Christopher Ryan. “We figured that the songs were strong enough to stand on their own two feet, so whatever we put them through would just make them stronger and take us in some new directions.” Dennis adds, “The fact that we’d spent so much time with these songs allowed us to be really free once we got into the studio. No one was overthinking anything, and because of that the album sounds like us in a way that we’d never captured to this extent before.” Featuring guest musicians like Steve Berlin of Los Lobos–and background vocals from singer/songwriters like Courtney Marie Andrews, Vanessa Carlton (who is also McCauley’s wife), Kam Franklin, Angela Miller, and Sheree Smith–Deer Tick’s ATO Records debut adds an even greater vitality to their feverish collection of timeless rock-and-roll.
Mostly recorded live–and honed down from nearly 20 songs to a concise, thoughtfully curated ten–Emotional Contracts brings its combustible but sharply crafted sound to an often-pensive look inward. “A lot of these songs are about standing at a certain point in your life and reflecting on what’s transpired so far, reckoning with the past but looking ahead with a pragmatic hope for the future,” says Chris. Opening on a blistering burst of guitar, Emotional Contracts begins that reflection with “If I Try To Leave”–the first-ever co-write between McCauley and O’Neil. “Most of us have families now, and that song came from imagining how lost and aimless I’d feel if I just walked away from everything,” says McCauley. “It’s about how much I need that grounding force of family in my life.” “If I Try To Leave,” partly inspired by the warmth and grit of Keith Richards’s solo records, builds a sublimely bombastic backdrop to the song’s lucid self-revelation (“Some animals survive/But I only play dead/If I were to leave/From my own beloved”), and illuminates Deer Tick’s undeniable gift for twisting melancholy into something glorious.
Next, on “Forgiving Ties,” O’Neil takes the lead for an anguished yet exuberant track that finds McCauley chiming in to play the part of his jittery inner voice–lending another layer of lived-in pathos to the song’s punchy introspection (“All of my confidence/It had a warrant/Knocked on the door/And split open my mind”). “As you get older, you end up having to come to terms with traumas from your past while also dealing with the weight of certain responsibilities that you maybe didn’t have when you were younger,” says O’Neil. “That’s especially true of raising a family, but it also applies to how this band has become more and more precious to us the longer it goes on.” Featuring the spirited trumpet work of Fridmann’s son Jon (who also played flute, French horn, glockenspiel, marimba, and trombone across various songs), “Forgiving Ties” bounces along on a brightly frenetic cascade of rhythms achieved through a mid-session free-for-all. “We had a little party where we all went crazy with a bunch of different percussion items, like cowbell and a whole other litany of things,” O’Neil recalls. “It’s a dance song that’s completely authentic to who we are as a band,” adds Dennis.
As revealed throughout Emotional Contracts, that unbridled authenticity stems from Deer Tick’s staying faithful to their instincts while tapping into the ineffable power of their easy camaraderie. On “Once In A Lifetime,” the band shares a gorgeously sprawling and soul-soothing track born from a spontaneously composed accordion part brought in by McCauley. “I recorded a voice memo of me fooling around with this accordion the very first day I bought it years ago, combined that with another riff, and then we all made a jam out of it,” he says. “It turned into a song about how when you see an opportunity you need to take it, because time is always running out.” Meanwhile, on “Running From Love,” Deer Tick deliver a sweetly confessional, ’70s-R&B-inspired slow-burner that first came to Dennis in a dream. “I dreamed that the band was performing at Roger Williams Park in Providence and we were all singing this song a cappella, with the whole crowd singing along,” he says. “I woke up and sang it into my phone while I was rocking the baby, and then brought it to the band later on. It’s funny because at first I didn’t really take the song seriously, but with the help of my friends we ended up bringing it to life.”
After the one-two punch of “My Ship” (a lovely reverie co-written by McCauley and The Rugburns’ Steve Poltz) and “A Light Can Go Out In The Heart” (a particularly wistful track from O’Neil), Emotional Contracts closes out with the all-enveloping catharsis of “The Real Thing.” Another product of their deliberately free-flowing process, the nine-minute-long epic emerged from a jam at their rain-battered rehearsal space. “At first I had an idea for a song called ‘The Last Book on the Shelf,’ which I ended up using as a title for a song about all the creepy book-banning happening lately,” McCauley notes. “‘The Real Thing’ became about living with depression, which has been part of my existence since I was a kid, and how it takes even more work to keep your head above water as you get older.” As the song drifts from brooding urgency to dreamlike grandeur, Deer Tick intensify its captivating impact with an ever-shifting tapestry of sonic details (moody strings, reverbed snare, lush flute melodies, intermittently muted vocals). “Dave had me go through that song about five times and create different types of feedback for an hour straight,” O’Neil points out. “It’s a good example of how great he is at piecing together different elements and keeping even a very long song like that exciting all the way through. When I look back on our other records I can remember some incredibly frustrating moments where you’re working on a solo for six hours or something, but there really was nothing frustrating about making this album.”
Founded by McCauley in 2004, with the lineup solidified in 2009, Deer Tick partly attribute their unfaltering chemistry to a shared sense of humor. To that end, the album takes its title from an inside joke regarding potential aliases for the band. “We were saying that if we had to play a secret show under a fake name, we could be The Hitmen and dress in pinstripe suits like Prohibition-era gangsters. Then we decided, ‘Let’s just release an album as The Hitmen—we’ll call it Emotional Contracts, like contract-killing on an emotional level,” says McCauley. “But the title connects here with each song somehow–every song is about a deal you’ve made with yourself at some level.” But as a phenomenally rowdy live act who once averaged 250 shows a year, Deer Tick mainly credit their deep-rooted connection to a mutual love for the unpredictability of the musical impulse. “I feel very lucky that we all ran into each other at some point pretty early on in our lives,” says McCauley. “From the start, I just wanted to find other musicians that would somehow all stick together, which definitely isn’t easy. But we all have a real fascination with music, and that desire to never limit ourselves or repeat ourselves is something that we all very much continue to share.”
Austin, TX-based power trio Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol sound just about as big and dumb as their moniker would imply. They’re also as ridiculously awesome as their big, dumb moniker would imply. Since 2017 or thereabouts, vocalist and eight-string slinger Leo Lydon, bassist Aaron Metzdorf and drummer Sean St.Germain have been churning out lumbering cascades of clobbering, trucker hat riffage that toe a slobbery line between Dinosaur Jr., Primus, Pantera and ZZ Top (though yours truly hears a bunch of Netherlands, Dangers and Helmet in there as well) all working to leave untold pounds of undigested red meat in your lower intestine and unadulterated metallic ear worms beating the living tar out of your malleus, incus and stapes.
But hey, why not see for yourself by checking out the latest single from their forthcoming (read: release date is tomorrow) sixth tellingly-titled album, Big Dumb Riffs. The song on the listening block is affectionately called “1-800-EAT-SHIT” and in Metzdorf’s words: “The whole writing process was, ‘what if we just played two notes the whole song?’ ‘What if we tuned down to almost unusable string tension?’ ‘What if we write a record that will make everyone say ‘wow that is dumb’? Leo and I really move around on stage a lot. Being a dingus is crucial to the groove. All these riffs were designed to allow us to act bigger and dumber on stage.”
Check it out here and check out where and when you can see these dinguses acting bigger and dumber on stage.
RICKSHAW BILLIE’S BURGER PATROL LIVE 2024:
03/22 Austin, TX – St Elmo Brewing – album release show – SOLD OUT
My Morning Jacket and Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats have teamed up for a co-headlining tour that runs through September. Dubbed the Eye to Eye Tour, the bands will perform equal-length sets and switch the order of their performances with each show.
Tickets go on sale this Friday, March 29, at 10 a.m. local time, with presale tickets available beginning March 26 at 10 a.m. local time. More information is available on the official tour website.
“We were lucky enough to see Nathaniel and some of the Night Sweats at Preservation Hall in New Orleans some years ago — our minds were blown, our hearts were opened, and we got swept up in the joy of it all,” My Morning Jacket’s Jim James said in a statement. “We are so happy to share the stage with these fine folks for a run full of peace, love, music, and fun!”
Rateliff added, “We are long-time lovers of My Morning Jacket and have grown a close friendship over the years. It’s so special to become friends with musicians and peers that you admire, and we’re looking forward to bringing our love for each other on the road.”
My Morning Jacket released their most recent self-titled album, the band’s ninth studio LP, in 2021. That same year, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats dropped their third studio album, The Future.
Eye to Eye Tour Dates
Sept. 10 – Wilmington, NC @ Live Oak Bank Pavilion at Riverfront Park
Sept. 12 – Charleston, SC @ Credit One Stadium
Sept. 13 – Charlotte, NC @ PNC Music Pavilion
Sept. 14 – Alpharetta, GA @ Ameris Bank Amphitheatre
Sept. 16 – Jacksonville, FL @ Daily’s Place
Sept. 18 – Nashville, TN @ Ascend Amphitheater
Sept. 19 – Nashville, TN @ Ascend Amphitheater
Sept. 24 – Syracuse, NY @ Empower Federal Credit Union Amphitheater at Lakeview
Sept. 26 – Philadelphia, PA @ TD Pavilion at the Mann
Sept. 27 – Columbia, MD @ Merriweather Post Pavilion
Sept. 28 – Raleigh, NC @ Coastal Credit Union Music Park
Girl Garçon (formerly Glove) is at the forefront of cutting-edge new aged nostalgia. Funneling the feeling of a seedy nightclub into a well-polished package, the pure magnetism and style of the group won them early attention from some of music’s biggest tastemakers across the streaming, media and live music planes. Continuing that momentum with each subsequent release, Girl Garçon is penning the soundtrack to dystopian rapture.
Formed in Tampa, FL, and made up of Rod Wendt, Brie Deux and Justin Burns, Girl Garçon are a fluid unit wherein there is not a singular front person. This aligns with the band’s creative ethos in opposition to being categorized as one fixed configuration, but rather, amorphous, generating intrigue, suspense, and excitement among fans. Girl Garçon’s live performances are something like a mosh pit mixed with Studio 54, gracing the stages of Lollapalooza, Shaky Knees and ACL, and on the road with Jack White, Spoon, Foals and many others.
In 2022, the band released their debut album Boom Nights. Produced by Cage The Elephant’s Brad Shultz, the album went on to receive praise from Rolling Stone, office Magazine, NME, DIY and Document Journal. Following the album’s release, the band was called out to the road in support of Nation of Language, A Place To Bury Strangers, Jack White, Spoon and Foals, further cementing them as your favorite band’s favorite new band.
I’m sure there’s a reason or back story as to how Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol decided on their name. If you can get over the daft moniker, the good news is that Big Dumb Riffs, the new (and sixth) album from the Austin based band, is absolutely smashing. The trio consist of Leo Lydon (8string guitar/vocals), Aaron Metzdorf (bass/gang vocals) and Sean St. Germain (thunder drums/gang vocals) and they create the most brilliant doom sludge pop combination I’ve ever heard. Not that I’ve ever heard any other act try that combination. There are reference points and influences to cite but naming them just won’t do this band’s sound justice. You have to experience it for yourself. Note I said experience, not listen, as this album has to be played LOUD to be fully enjoyed.
Opener ‘Bastard Initiated’ blasts along at breakneck speed, Leo’s marmite vocals a monotone drone firing off missives. ‘Blue Collar Man’ contains an addictively simple sludgy riff that digs into your head like a blunt spade. Sean’s slamming beats are minimal yet have a huge impact with their simplicity. ‘Body Bag’ has a sledgehammer riff that chips concrete over a filthy slow pounding beat. Leo sounds unhinged but in the cheekiest way imaginable. The grinding groove will have you nodding your head like a loaded-up stoner.
The riff on ‘Brat’ is insanely addictive and as big and dumb as the album title suggests, yet it feels fresh. It’s so incredibly physical as a sound force you feel your ears pump when you listen to it through earbuds. Twisted genius. ‘Clowntown’ ups the pace with a whipcrack groove that snaps with evil intent. ‘El Sappo’ takes the silliness to a new level with some frankly bizarre vocals from Leo. The band decide to create a sludge version of ZZ Top, try and forget that it sounds a little like Limp Bizkit too.
Ever wondered what Morrissey fronting a sludge band would sound like? Well, here’s ‘In A Jar’ to fulfil that scenario. Over a bass riff so deep it’s practically tectonic Leo tries his hand at a croon of sorts. When he the sings the line “feel my hands wrapped around your throat, I’m going to fucking kill you” it’s hard to be particularly shocked by the level of violent intent as he sounds so nice. ‘Papa Pop It’ has a masterful groove like a funk version of a slowed down Slayer. Once again, they verge awfully close to Limp Bizkit but it still retains a quirky enjoyable charm.
As I said at the outset, it’s really very hard to take a band with the name Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol seriously. Then they have a song called ‘Peanut Butter Snack Sticks’ and new levels of daftness get unlocked. This track is probably the hardest hitting of the songs on the album with a jagged riff and explosive beats. On ‘Whip It Around’ yet again I’m dumbfounded at the simplicity of the riffs that somehow sound fresh and inventive. Is it because it is played with the most down tuned guitars ever created? Closing track ‘1800EATSHIT’ is like one of the knock-off hardcore songs the Beastie Boys used to release when conventional rap musicianship got boring. It’s a rip snorting groove that locks into the groove like a heat seeking missile and refuses to let go.
I was really truly surprised by how much this album impressed me right from the get-go. You really need to be in a certain mood to fully embrace the pure fun of the riffs and songs here. Sophistication is not high on the agenda, yet someone somewhere has a keen ear for detail to actually manifest such an incredible level of intense noise in such a small space. At only 20 minutes long, this album can really shift a mood and if you need some release from the daily grind, there’s no better way to beat the blues. It’s big, it’s dumb, it’s fucking rifftastic, job done!
With 2022’s spine-tingling debut ‘Unlearning’, Glasgow glam-pop collective Walt Disco marked themselves out as one of the most intriguing outfits on the UK’s alternative scene. On brilliant follow-up ‘The Warping’, however, they’re shapeshifting boldly into the band they were always meant to be…
There is no such thing as standing still. Not really. Walt Disco understand this better than most.
Breaking out on the eve of COVID, the Glaswegian collective could have been caught in the suffocating stasis of lockdown. Instead, they plotted a way forward, pouring empty, uncertain months into striking debut LP Unlearning.
Rather than building conservatively close to home as life opened up again, they harnessed that record’s momentum to get out and see the world. And as technical difficulties threaten to derail their homecoming at McChuills Bar when we meet on a balmy Wednesday at the tail end of Scottish summer, they just sit back and smile, quietly assured that it’ll take more than dodgy speakers to stop tonight’s sweaty soft launch for superb second album The Warping.
“It’s a record about change,” smiles ‘matriarch’ and vocalist Jocelyn Si, surrounded by bandmates Finlay McCarthy (synths), Lewis Carmichael (guitar), Charlie Lock (bass) and Jack Martin (drums) in the calm before the storm. “It’s about reacting to change, being afraid of change, wanting things to change. Unlearning could be seen as an album about unlearning habits and how we think about things in our lives. The Warping is about changing how we deal with those things moving forward.”
At the forefront of that conversation is personal change. Compared to Unlearning’s disentanglement from societal norms and the outside world, The Warping is inherently more introverted. The title track, for instance, is a powerful exploration of gender dysphoria and envy, which finds Si pondering and processing the emotions and insecurities that come with being trans, ultimately finding catharsis in radical honesty. Dig deeper, though, and there are profound ruminations on separation too; the distance that can open up when the changes you go through detach you from life events like the death of a family pet or the sale of a childhood home. The nursery-rhymed inflections of ‘Black Chocolate’ tap into an almost-childlike appreciation of the security of family, while ‘I Will Travel’ finds that same constant grounding in a parent’s dog.
“It’s definitely a reaction to our experience of life in a band,” continues co-songwriter Martin. On album one, being locked down shielded them from the harsher realities of life on tour, which only made them hit harder this time. “I see the members of this band far more than I see my friends or family. A lot of material here comes through the lens of realisation that just because we’re away doesn’t mean that things stay the same at home. They don’t wait for us to get back. Life goes on.”
McCarthy shrugs. “I guess that’s just the price you pay to do all these amazing things that we’ve done. It’s a form of therapy to talk about that bittersweetness, but ultimately we’re grateful to be here.”
Indeed, Walt Disco have plenty to be grateful for. With Unlearning nominated for the Scottish Album of the Year Award and Best Independent Album at the AIM Awards, as well as their high-profile support slots with acts like Simple Minds, Duran Duran and Primal Scream, plus appearances at Glastonbury, Latitude and SXSW in the US, Walt Disco have built a global following. Hollywood superstar and cult queer icon Tilda Swinton called them her new favourite band. And as this feature goes to press, they’ll be on a continent-spanning European jaunt with English electronic icons Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD).
While Unlearning was written and recorded in the claustrophobia of their own homes and driven by the mainly electronic DIY tools at their disposal, The Warping is the result of transatlantic sessions from Los Angeles and Austin to London and Glasgow. Lead single ‘Pearl’, for instance — a bleak portrait of an imagined future where Martin is living alone with regret on Glasgow’s south side — is named after the Pearl Street Co-Op in Austin where they first toyed with its composition on a grand piano and features a voice-note from when they returned to that very spot. Real recording, meanwhile, included sessions at Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera’s studios in Surrey, with the majority taking place at The Vale in west London with co-producer Chris McCrory and engineer Chris D’Adda. Recorded almost entirely in analogue, the album draws on a whole new dimension of sound with horns, woodwind and strings.
“Does it make for a more atmospherically dense piece of music?” Si muses. “I think so. We have a lot more space to build out the size of the songs and add in those orchestral elements.”
“As you get older, you get a bit more profound,” says Martin, picking up the thread, while his bandmates name influences like Scott Walker, Sonic Youth, Sufjan Stevens and Kate Bush, as well as Grangemouth icons Cocteau Twins, Glasgow electro trailblazers The Blue Nile and Dundee post-punks The Associates. “You’re not as lost in your feelings and fears. You’re more objective about what you’re trying to achieve.”
“Plus,” Si adds, “it was interesting writing pop-oriented music when none of us were in love.”
“There wasn’t a lot of vague love language,” Martin agrees. “Fewer placeholder lyrics, too. There’s still love in there, but it has a different feel when it’s about love for friends, family, pets or even just the way that things are — to counterpoint the fear that they won’t always be — rather than being about being ‘in love’. It makes it more broadly human than any intense, specific romantic feelings.”
From the breathy delivery, widdly synths and rump-a-pump melodrama of opener ‘Gnomes’ via the faintly funk-infused attitude of ‘You Make Me Feel So Dumb’ and the skeletal vulnerability of Si to the widescreen experimentalism of grandstanding closer ‘Before the Walls’, the execution is bold and breathtaking, combining the intimacy of the album’s themes with the grandeur of an act ready to take over the world. Every experience they’ve enjoyed or endured over the past few years, right up to playing a crowd of 3,000 at Portugal’s Extramuralhas Goth Festival a few days before we convene, and tonight’s whites-of-their eyes homecoming has clarified the band they want to be.
“We’re not Broadway,” Si laughs. “We’re not even famous, but we talk as if we are dealing with the struggles of being a famous Broadway act. We’re haggard and showbiz, basically.”
“And we’re not afraid to have fun,” nods Martin. “We get serious on tracks like ‘The Captain’ — touching on topics like global warming and toxic masculinity — but we turned it into an OTT Celtic sea song!”
“Why did we rhyme ‘cantankerous’ with ‘can’t anchor us’?” Si teases. “Because it’s fun!”
They’re ready to be figureheads, too, not just for the queer community they’ve always stood for — compared to solo artists, there is scant representation among British bands — but for all young creatives hoping to push the boundaries and defy expectations through truly original art.
“We’re outcasts,” Martin concludes. “We make music for anyone open-minded. And plenty of people who are open-minded just haven’t had an experience where they can really embrace it yet. Maybe it would be easier for us if we were more ‘normal’ or stuck to one style, but our heroes — Bowie, Queen — all transcended genre to one degree or another, and it feels like we have to do the same!”
“We’re not here to make music for the middle- of-the-road,” McCarthy signs off with a wide smile. “We want people to be fully won over or totally disgusted. We’re not interested in the in-between!”
‘The Warping’ will be released on June 14 via Lucky Number.
Rock icon Jonathan Richman, who delighted an appreciative crowd at the Avalon Theatre last week, was dancing like no one was watching long before most of us had ever heard the phrase. In addition to writing a slew of great songs about dancing, including the crowd favorite Dancing in a Lesbian Bar, Richman is likely to break out in dance in the middle of a song. Where some might use guitar solos to take a song to another level, Richman just lays his guitar on the floor and dances.
Who is Jonathan Richman? He is a singer-songwriter who has been making music and touring for over 50 years. He is an iconoclast whose songs celebrate everything from his hometown of Boston to Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer and from the joys of wine to the joys of just walking down the street. Rolling Stone ranked his seminal song Roadrunner at #77 in its list of greatest songs ever (right between Richman would be amused to see, Reach Out (and I’ll Be There) and I Walk the Line). But Richman did not play Roadrunner last week. He plays without a set list and chooses the songs he wants to play at any given moment.
What he did play was a 22-song set of his unique music that absolutely thrilled the overflow audience at the theatre. Ranging from 1976’s Girlfren to a few songs that I’m pretty sure he improvised on the spot, and singing in English, French, Italian, Arabic (I think), and Ojibway, Richman shared a stunningly diverse set. But, however diverse, every song was authentically Jonathan Richman. (Girlfren, it’s worth noting, contains, as Richman acknowledged from the stage, one of the worst rhymes in the history of recorded music: “That’s a girlfriend/Said G-I-R-L-F-R-E-N.”)
In a recent interview, Richman explained, “Some of the songs presented might be in different languages; this is not to be esoteric or clever, it’s because the different languages help me express different feelings sometimes.” He is inspired by paintings (and has songs about Picasso, Vermeer and Matise), poetry, and by colors (as evidenced by one of his newer songs, an instrumental entitled “Guitar In Orange Drums In Pale Purple”).
At the Avalon, Richman accompanied himself on guitar and was joined by his long-time drummer, Tommy Larkins. Richman’s guitar sound is as unique as his songwriting – he plays an acoustic guitar strung with nylon strings such as a classical or flamenco guitarist would use, and often seems to get so carried away in his singing and dancing that he just forgets to play. Larkins – with his long-sleeve black t-shirt, jeans, uncombed hair, unshaven face, and dark sunglasses – looked just as much like a rock star as Richman looked like a suburban dad (or grandfather). It is challenging to provide rhythm for music that can be as quiet as Richman’s; Larkins got it just right.
Here is what is most memorable about Richman’s songs and his performance: They are 100% guileless. Richman has an extensive set of lyrical tools at his disposal, but they do not seem to include sarcasm, snark, or irony. Their absence can be jarring to today’s listeners. When he sings, for example, “In Tompkins Square Park, a couple is meeting/Say what you want, but I feel my heart beating/ Cause I love springtime in New York/Springtime in New York I do,” (from Springtime in New York) there is no escaping his genuine and almost childlike enthusiasm.
Richman is a one-of-a-kind artist. His songwriting is sophisticated and simple at the same time. His dancing is endearing, his stage presence welcoming, and his love of life is contagious. I cannot remember a more fun night of music.
Mark Pelavin, the founder of Hambleton Cove Consulting, is a writer, consultant, and music lover living very happily in St. Michaels.
Music has always loomed large in the life of Don Was. Born in Detroit in 1952, he has enjoyed a multi-faceted career as a musician, record producer, music director, film composer, documentary filmmaker and radio host. Since 2011, he has also served as President of America’s venerated jazz label, Blue Note Records.
For his work as a record producer, he has won six Grammy Awards – including Album of the Year in 1989 for Bonnie Raitt’s Nick of Time and Producer of the Year in 1994. Records that Don has produced have sold close to 100 million albums for a wide array of artists like The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, John Mayer, Ringo Starr, Wayne Shorter, The B52s and Charles Lloyd. In 1995 he produced and directed a documentary about the life of Brian Wilson, I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times, that won the San Francisco Film Festival’s Golden Gate Award. As a film composer, he won the 1994 British Academy Award (BAFTA) for Best Original Score in recognition of his work on the film Backbeat. He won the 2014 Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Direction for his work on the CBS TV special The Beatles: The Night That Changed America. In 2018 Don was invited to join Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir to form the Wolf Brothers. They continue to consistently tour the US.
In 2011 Was became President of the iconic jazz label Blue Note Records. He fiercely protects the company’s eighty-five-year-old legacy, meticulously caretaking the revered catalog of Black American Music. This includes maintaining the availability and quality of vinyl reissues in the Tone Poet and Classic Jazz audiophile release series. He also signs and produces many of the label’s recent roster of artists including, Robert Glasper, Charles Lloyd, Wayne Shorter, Dr Lonnie Smith, Gregory Porter and Jason Moran.
Don’s deep Detroit roots keep him anchored to the city where, where for the last 15 years he has music directed and played bass in the Don Was Detroit All Star Revue concerts which are part of Detroit’s annual diversity festival, The Concert of Colors. From 2009-2012 Don hosted a weekly Sirius XM radio show on the Outlaw Country channel called The Motor City Hayride. Since 2021, he co-hosts a weekly, live radio show on Detroit’s NPR station, WDET-FM called The Don Was Motor City Playlist. Don is also the voice of Neville the Dog in the hit Amazon Prime Video children’s show, Pete the Cat.
THE PAN-DETROIT ENSEMBLE
Don Was’ latest group, The Pan-Detroit Ensemble, is a band made up of stellar jazz musicians from his hometown. “There’s a unique sound and feel to Detroit that permeates the music in a way that resonates all over the globe’, says Was. “There is a rawness, a lack of pretension and an unmistakable, underlying groove that reflects the people and culture of the entire city” The band includes long time collaborators like Blue Note Records artist Dave McMurray on sax and Eminem’s Oscar-winning collaborator, keyboardist Luis Resto. Additional musicians include trombonist Vincent Chandler, trumpeter John Douglas, drummer Jeff Canaday, percussionist Mahindi Masai, guitarist Wayne Gerard and vocalist Steffanie Christi’ann.
“When the opportunity came to put together a new band, the message was clear to me: go back to Detroit where I came from, be who I am, play like who I am and team up with some like-minded individuals”, says Was.
Austin, TX bred, Die Spitz exploded onto the scene with their absolute ripper of an EP, “Teeth.” During their Audiotree Live performance, Die Spitz delivers a masterclass in precision-blade punk, showcasing the monstrous energy that earned them accolades like The Austin Chronicle’s “Music Video of the Year” and “Album of the Year” Austin Music Awards. During their interview with Audiotree Host, Rita Lukea, the band chats about their favorite albums, hypothetical alternate career paths, and more.
“This little guy is someone we picked up on the road,” Squirrel Flower, aka songwriter Ella Williams, says between songs, referencing a tiny toy alligator resting on her mic stand. The Chicago-based indie rocker stopped by the Tiny Desk on the heels of touring her latest album, Tomorrow’s Fire. Here, she plays stripped back versions of her thundering rock songs without her band, giving way for her low register, affecting lyricism and guitar skills to shine.
There’s an intensity unique to each song Williams plays in her Tiny Desk set. “I told you, I’ve never been in love,” she begins on the aching “Almost Pulled Away.” On “Alley Light,” she sings about not being able to take things slow, musing “maybe that’s why she loves me.” The set seems to reach its apex on “Finally Rain,” when Williams’ vocals ring the loudest. But then for the closer, “Iowa 146,” Williams thaws as she performs with a quiet kind of focus that’s just as powerful. She carefully plucks her strings and asks gently: “If I play you guitar, will everything fall away?”
Cardinals start as a joke between two sixteen-year-olds in a sleepy fishing town on the southern coast of Ireland. A whole joke-taken-to-heart later and their difference is marked by an early immersion in Cork’s live music scene, ‘we wanted to juxtapose ourselves,’ says frontman Euan Manning,‘we have pop-leaning influences and didn’t want to shy away from that.’ Now barely twenty, the six-piece are next in an Irish line changing the sound of alternative music.
Blending Ireland’s musical beating heart with a swell of contemporary frisson, the six-piece are tied to making music they enjoy whilst being perpetually kept outside of their comfort zone. The result is an eclectic gothic amalgam of shoegaze, Irish trad folk, and rock which incorporates 60s Wall of Sound elements for a punk-inflected noise that ‘wants to be warm pop.’ Underpinning this trademark friction is a soft narrative arc which chases a stark vulnerability, ‘I’ve heard music and seen films and somehow felt less alone,’ says Euan, ‘if we can do that for someone else, then that’s cool in my books.’
Nick Lowe has made his mark as a producer (Elvis Costello-Graham Parker-Pretenders-The Damned), songwriter of at least three songs you know by heart, short-lived career as a pop star, and a lengthy term as a musicians’ musician. But in his current ‘second act’ as a silver-haired, tender-hearted but sharp-tongued singer-songwriter, he has no equal.
Starting with 1995′s ‘The Impossible Bird’ through to 2011′s ‘The Old Magic,’ Nick has turned out a fantastic string of albums, each one devised in his West London home, and recorded with a core of musicians who possess the same veteran savvy. Lowe brings wit and understated excellence to every performance, leading Ben Ratliff of the New York Times to describe his live show as “elegant and nearly devastating.”
Los Straitjackets are the leading practitioners of the lost art of the guitar instrumental. Using the music of the Ventures, The Shadows, and with Link Wray and Dick Dale as a jumping off point, the band has taken their unique, high energy brand of original rock & roll around the world. Clad in their trademark Lucha Libre Mexican wrestling masks, the “Jackets” have delivered their trademark guitar licks to 16 albums, thousands of concerts and dozens of films and TV shows.
Together Nick & The Straitjackets have toured extensively around Europe and the United States, and are releasing an EP of new songs in June 2017.
The multi-talented musician, who plays more than seven different instruments, originally lended his skills on the fiddle to Chapman, 59, back when she was out on the very first Lilith Fair tour — a traveling music festival headlined by female acts in the late ’90s.
“She asked if I was free to do it with her, and I thought — I was a big fan of Tracy — so I said, ‘Sure, let’s do it,'” Campbell, 68, tells PEOPLE. “And so we did that for about three or four weeks, I guess, and then I haven’t had an opportunity to play with her since.”
The 24-year-long drought came to an end thanks to Chapman, who simply picked up the phone.
“She called me a month or so ago, around Christmas, and said that this was a possibility and would I make myself available,” says Campbell. “I said, ‘Hell yeah.’ And man, I’m so glad I did it.”
After making only a handful of appearances over the last decade, singer-songwriter Chapman joined Luke Combs at the Grammys to perform “Fast Car,” which originally was released in 1988.
Though Campbell admits he wasn’t familiar with country star Combs prior to the joint performance (“I don’t follow the modern country thing,” he says), Campbell knew he was in for something incredibly special the moment they met each other.
“I heard him sing and got to know him and saw the way he related to Tracy and all of us, and man, this guy deserves to be right where he is. He’s so genuine. There’s not a false bone in his body. And that comes across right away,” Campbell says of the two-time CMA entertainer of the year winner. “Same with Tracy, for sure. And the chemistry between the two of them, and then all of us after a couple of rehearsals for this thing, it was just magic. It was a beautiful place to be.”
Campbell’s wife of 35 years, Teresa Williams, cheered on her husband from home. The two are preparing to release their latest album, All This Time, on April 5.
“His wedding ring and the fiddle got a great Grammy moment,” Williams quips with a laugh. “No, it was perfect. I’m just making a joke,” she quips.
All kidding aside, Williams was surprised by how much the performance of “Fast Car” moved her — and how nostalgic it made her feel.
“I thought they did a beautiful job with it. I loved that song and that record when it was first out. I just remember the emotions I had listening to it back then. [Larry] and I were separated then for work. And both of us, being away from home, it was some kind of relief to hear it again,” she tells PEOPLE. “And I’ve heard Luke Combs, and I’m so glad that he loved it enough to do it, too. It just felt great.”
Plant and Krauss are playing more U.S. dates this year — in their only interview, they tell us us about the future of their collaboration and a whole lot more
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss aren’t ready to stop singing together just yet. “We’ve been doing this on and off since 2007,” says Krauss, “and it’s just gotten better every time we’ve gotten together.” So after touring for the past two years behind their second collaborative album, 2021’s Raise the Roof, they’re adding 28 tour dates this year, beginning in June. Krauss and Plant jumped on a Zoom with Rolling Stone for their only interview about the new tour, explaining why they just can’t quit each other, discussing future plans, breaking down their set list, and much more. You can hear even more of the conversation on the latest episode of our Rolling Stone Music Now podcast — go here for the podcast provider of your choice, listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or just press play below.
Obviously you’ve been enjoying these shows enough to add more. What makes them so special for you?
Robert Plant: Well, we’ve been growing from the nervous formality of the very initial kicking it off after so many years of being apart and not really being sure, or even imagining that we would ever get back together. If you go back to all that time ago, in the beginning of the Raise the Roof recordings, the idea of taking it beyond there was it was very tentative, really, but nerve-wracking. And I don’t know if you think this, Alison, but when we doing some TV clips [early on] with Duane Eddy and James Burton and stuff, how are we to know from that kind of formal delivery, very neatly done, that we would end up as a particularly far-out, loose band, quite funky and extending all our songs? I think that’s the thing. We just grew more and more into a new place, and that’s what gave us the impetus to try this again.
Alison Krauss: It’s felt great. I’m really glad that we’ve been able to revisit this as many times as we have. The band has more room, and I get a little more consistency with what’s happening when it’s time for me to jump in and sing harmony. And I thought, “Oh, it’ll be too long in between …” But it’s amazing how quickly the months go by before we go out again. I’m really looking forward to doing it again.
Alison, when you mentioned a little more consistency, I know that was always kind of an issue. Robert sings with a lot of freedom and improvisation, so it was always a challenge to harmonize. How are those things changing to make it easier?
Krauss: Oh, I don’t know if they’re changing [laughs]. It’s just that I can catch a little bit more of his phrasing when he looks my way. He’s always very funny, because he’s like, “Don’t worry about it!” He goes, “It’s the same. It’s the same every time.” And i’m like, “It’s never the same!” So, you know, I gotta hang on for dear life.
Plant: I don’t notice any of that!
Of course not.
Krauss: [Laughs] He doesn’t notice.
Plant: I think you do such a great job. I feel the viking lodestone moving around to magnetic north when you are doing the things that you do. So regal and beautiful … For me, it’s like Asbury Park, like a fairground ride at times, just to try and remember harmony positions, which I was not born into, because I was a rock & roll singer, trying to be Dion, all those years ago.
I’ve learned a lot, and those moments are hair-raising. It’s great to be learning and be contrite and humble and come into your dressing room bowing and saying “Can you just explain the last harmony to me again?”
Krauss: It’s not quite like that!
Plant: But whatever it is, it worked. The thing is it worked. Everybody stepped out from the place that they began. I can’t wait to do this again, stand side by side and enjoy where people are going. Instead of it just being “Here’s the rendition. And here it is again.” Instead of that, we’ve got a lot of intuitive expression within the songs, which was why we didn’t want to let it go when we got to the very last shows. It was quite emotional, really, saying goodbye to it.
What have the two of you both been up to since July, when the last dates ended?
Krauss: I’ve been in the studio recording. And that’s a tedious process.
Plant: I’ve got a group of friends that I play with over here a little bit from time to time. I’ve also been going through all that stuff that I never released and never quite got finished. And getting excited about it. Going, “Wow. What am I going to do with that?” It’s the idioms, the visitation, the places that I’ve been musically which were not complete are just mind-boggling, and they’re a little bit overwhelming.
Are you writing new songs as well, Robert?
Plant: I’ve got a Tascam digital recorder, and I sing, and I put the vocals through a guitar pedal, and then I record them on that over there, and it sounds great. Why bother to go to the studio? But I can’t find words. This is a very difficult time to try and wax lyrical out there.
Robert, you recently found the poster from your very first gig, which is extraordinary. “The Black Snake Moan, the weirdest, wildest sound in R&B.” It must have been a bizarre thing to contemplate the idea that it was 60 years ago.
Plant: Yeah, in fact, I’m looking at it now. I opened a box up, and I found some letters. And I found this advert. Self-made, very amateur, but I was 15. It’s just fantastic. Oh, I could do that all again. That’s an amazing piece of music, “That Black Snake Moan.” Many mornings I play that when I start my day, just to remember how incredibly, remarkably talented [Blind] Lemon Jefferson was and how funny his lyrics are. He’s pulling together all those very questionable lyrics. A “Black Snake Moan” is quite a way to start the day.
I love that. Alison, in your genre, it’s taken for granted that people will stay onstage until, basically, they can’t stand up anymore, even beyond. You’re quite young still, but I’m sure that you’ve always taken it for granted that you’re going to be doing this if you can when you’re 80 or 90.
Krauss: You never know how you’re going to feel, and you never know when you’re going to feel different. With this music, I think so many people started so young, and they toured so much. It’s all they knew. It’s hard to say, what I’m going to feel when when I get older.
Robert, there’s people of your generation retiring. Do you think about retirement? You seem to love being on the road, so do you want to just push it as long as you can push it?
Plant: The camaraderie, the things that you share up there, and the frailties that you know you’re carrying with you quietly, the exposure of yourself to yourself, is something that I would hate to say goodbye to. I can’t just sit back. Out there in the real world, people say to me, “What about the book?” And I say, “Are you kidding? What? This is spectacular. Why think about it twice?” This is today. What happened in Schenectady in 1969 is another story. And for me, the continuum must keep going. Today, I was pulling all my lyric books out and going, “Gotta get the groove back. I’ve got something to say.” So yeah, I’m going to keep going — as long as they’ve got effects machines that make me sound good [laughs]. Well, it worked for Elvis! Listen to the compression on his voice on some of those big ballads in ’57.
Robert, you sang “Stairway to Heaven” for the first time in many years at a charity event last year. What did that feel like?
Plant: It was cathartic. People go, “Oh, that’s good. He never was going to do that.” But I didn’t really do it! I just blurted it out. ‘Cause it’s such an important song to me for where I was at the time and where I was with Jimmy and with John and Bonzo. So on that night, it was what it was. It was a trial by fire, but I felt better at the end than at the beginning.
I was thinking it could be the last time you ever sing that song. Would you be OK with that?
Plant: Yeah, I think you’re probably right. I haven’t got around to doing the ice-skating rinks in Finland yet with a small orchestra [laughs]. So I don’t think I’ll be doing that, but I don’t know. Who knows? Something could change somewhere. Spirit and heart could come back in the soul. It’s a long song. Who can remember all those words?
Finally, you have these 30 or so dates, and you have your own careers. What are your hopes for the future of this collaboration?
Plant: I really hope that we pull a cat out of the bag again.
Krauss: We have had such a great time making those records and touring that I’d love to see it happen again, too. I feel like we’ve made something new when we recorded together. The whole thing has been a surprise for me. And I know it was for Robert too, although he seems to have more bravery in this department.
Plant: Doing gigs is doing gigs, but actually making magic in the room is the only way you get to a gig. Once you’ve got it, you can’t really blow it out of the water unless you have a real difference in personality. We don’t have that because we laugh at each other, but underneath it all there’s a lot of love and a strong affinity. It’s good. It’s really good.
Can’t Let Go Tour 2024
June 2 – Tulsa, OK – Cain’s Ballroom
June 4 – Camdenton, MO – Ozarks Amphitheater*
June 5 – Lincoln, NE – Pinewood Bowl Theater*
June 7 – Prior Lake, MN – Mystic Lake Amphitheater*
June 8 – Madison, WI – Breese Stevens Field*
June 11 – Des Moines, IA – Lauridsen Amphitheater at Waterworks Park*
On the 10th anniversary of ‘Rising Son’, Kuroda discusses his musical journey, discusses he and Jose James’ seminal iteration of “Everybody Loves the Sunshine” and more.
It’s a rainy January day in Brooklyn, and Takuya Kuroda has been afforded a brief respite from his packed schedule. With space to think, he gets to reminiscing. “It’s funny: I’ll still get DMs saying ‘I love your song! It’s so fresh!’” the trumpeter says, referring to the version of Roy Ayers Ubiquity track “Everybody Loves the Sunshine” that he reimagined alongside vocalist Jose James. “I’m like ‘It’s not my song! … It’s amazing that my arrangement of that song can open so many doors for people.”
Kuroda is far from nostalgic. Miles Davis, one of his significant trumpet influences alongside Clifford Brown and Freddie Hubbard, once said, “If anyone wants to keep creating, they have to be about change.” That mindset has also been at the forefront of Kuroda’s creative output over his nearly two-decade career as a bandleader, composer, side man and more.
But on this occasion, he’s got good reason to reflect. 2024 marks the 10th anniversary of Rising Son, the 2014 album he released on Blue Note that garnered him vast notoriety in the jazz world and made him the first-ever Japanese artist to cut a record for the label. It’s also being reissued on vinyl for the first time since its original pressing (which now goes for upwards of $500 on Discogs), as he regained the rights to the album after Blue Note’s 10-year exclusivity period on it expired.
Across the eight-track project, which includes the aforementioned “Everybody Loves the Sunshine” cover, Kuroda established himself as a force to be reckoned with. He expertly stirs his various influences, from growing up as a jazz-obsessed teen in Ashiya, Japan to his move to New York City for jazz studies at The New School – a period eventually landing him in both James’ band and the Brooklyn Afrobeat collective Akoya. His crisp, light-but-not-airy trumpet playing both soars above and weaves itself through everything, including the sizzling hip-hop drums of “Piri Piri,” the sweet, soulful feel of “Green and Gold” (a second Ayers cover) and the Afrobeat-inflicted rhythms of “Afro Blue.”
The record hit #1 on Japan’s jazz charts upon release, and “Everybody Loves the Sunshine” has since become an algorithm darling, currently sitting at almost 23 million plays on Spotify and 15 million views on YouTube. It’s even been remixed as a bonus track for Rising Son‘s anniversary edition, with Joe Armon-Jones of Ezra Collective fame putting his twist on it, alongside drum patterns from Morgan Simpson. “I’m immensely proud to have been asked to do this remix,” Armon-Jones told Hypebeast. “Takuya is a legend, and he and Jose’s take on this track is an absolute classic.”
A lot’s changed for Kuroda, both personally and professionally, since Rising Son debuted. He’s released three more albums (2016’s Zigzagger, 2020’s Fly Moon Die Soon and 2022’s Midnight Crisp), served as the lead trumpeter for DJ Premier’s Badder Band, and composed, produced and written arrangements for many other artists. Though he’s always looking ahead — just like Miles — Kuroda wasn’t opposed to pausing his pursuit of new sounds to reflect on Rising Son, its influence and impact, and his winding creative path since then. “The [musical] journey is never an easy one, but the easy path usually isn’t worth walking,” he says.
It’s been 10 years since Rising Son was released. Is that a crazy benchmark for you? Has time flown by?
The past 10 years were so fast. I’m just now realizing again how big the album was for me and how it impacted the market and the jazz scene.
Was Rising Son a collection of all your experiences in life until that point, or more a window of that specific time period?
I’d say it was the story of my musical path, and the main part of the path that was spotlighted was my time in Jose James’ band. That’s because he was the ignition for the whole thing. He was like “Hey Tak [Kuroda’s nickname], I want to produce your album, and I want to release it through Blue Note.” I was like “Woah … how?!” [laughs].
How did you bring so many different styles together? There are elements of jazz, funk, soul, Afrobeat, hip-hop …
I initially came from a traditional, “authentic” jazz background, because I was playing stuff inspired by Count Basie, Freddie Hubbard, Miles Davis when I was a teenager in Japan. But when I was playing in Jose’s band, I got a lot of experience mixing all these different styles and leaning more on the beat side of things. Jose thought that I sounded great on that setup, and he wanted to mix that beat-driven side of things with some of the traditional styles I was doing, capturing a depth that we could send to clubs and DJs and give to our normal audience.
He really helped out with the conceptualization of the album as well. Before Rising Son, my process for making an album was centered around capturing every bit of who I was at the time, but Jose showed me the importance of having a concept, knowing who I wanted to reach and meeting them where they were. That was a huge lesson, and it’s opened so many doors for me since then.
Do you recall what the process of combining feel and theory on Rising Son was like? There are a lot of very hummable, earworm-style melodies on the project, but it’s not “simple” music by any stretch of the imagination.
Melodies are the most important part of my compositions. On Rising Son, I wouldn’t write down the melodies I created. I’d come up with a melody, leave it overnight, and then challenge myself to remember it the next day. I figured if I could remember it, most listeners would also be able to.
At the same time, though, I didn’t want anything to be too straightforward, so I put some complex harmonies under those simple melodies. When I play those songs with musicians who aren’t as familiar with them, they always say they’re way more difficult than they sound, because those tricky harmonies trigger the simple melodies. I still try to work that way to this day.
When Rising Son came out, there was a lot of talk about how it was a “fusion” record because of its wide array of influences. Ever since the late ‘60s and big records like Bitches Brew and Emergency!, any jazz album that doesn’t adhere to a “traditional” sound and mixes in elements from other genres of music has seemingly been given that label. What do you think of it, and why do people seem so intent on applying such a rigid definition to something as fluid as jazz, even today?
I think … [pauses] … the term itself is just too big, too vague. It doesn’t even make sense any more
True. It may have made more sense at first, when electric sounds were being introduced to jazz for the first time, but now it feels like a catch-all.
Yeah. I think that especially in the last 10 years, as it’s become easier to consume any and all types of music, music fans have gotten significantly more articulate when it comes to identifying sounds and inspirations. They can understand that just because one track on a jazz album is inspired by, say, Afrobeat, the whole thing isn’t a “fusion Afrobeat record.” The modern fan is very accurate at identifying what tracks draw from what genres.
Speaking of that mixing of genres, let’s talk about “Everybody Loves the Sunshine,” the Roy Ayers jazz-funk staple that you and Jose James put a really memorable twist on. Is that still most listeners’ entry point to your work?
Oh, yeah. Yeah, it is [laughs].
How does it feel to know a track you made a decade ago still resonates like that? It’s an algorithm favorite too, so many of the listeners may not have even heard it when it first came out.
It’s funny: I’ll still get DMs saying “I love your song! It’s so fresh!” I’m like … “It’s not my song!” Some people who are new to the music don’t even know who Roy Ayers is. It’s amazing, that people are so fond of it, and that in the case of some listeners, my arrangement of that song can open the doors to a ton of incredible music.
Everywhere I go, people want to hear the song, but I don’t sing — I play the trumpet — so it gets a little tricky. We’ve got this guy in my band now, Corey King, who can sing it real nice though. I’ve got a new arrangement that’s a mashup of Roy Ayers hits as well, and we’ve made that a staple of live shows recently because it can be done without vocals.
Do you ever consciously aim to create tracks with a wider popular appeal, or do you always stay true to your own creative process, undeterred by whether your creations will be “critically acclaimed” or not?
I just stay in my lane, man. Even when choosing songs to cover, my primary concern is picking tracks that make sense with my style of music or show the audience where my influences come from, not picking tracks that I think will have the broadest appeal. Besides Roy Ayers, I’ve covered “Think Twice” from Donald Byrd, “Tell Me a Bedtime Story” from Herbie Hancock, and, for our next album I’m working on a version of Issac Hayes tune.
On that note, what do you think of a whole new generation of young people discovering jazz? How different is the jazz listener now than they were 10 years ago?
The jazz audience is definitely getting younger. I’m lucky that I came to New York for school 20 years ago, because I was here when people like Robert Glasper, Esperanza Spalding and Jose James were creating a whole new approach to playing jazz. They made it very cross-generational and opened it up to listeners from the world of hip-hop, the world of dance music. Before that, it wasn’t nearly as easy. Jazz musicians were expected to dress a certain way, act a certain way, and now that that’s faded, I think we’re seeing a more diverse audience than ever before.
How would you describe your musical journey since 2014?
My career really took off after Rising Son was released, but it was my only album on Blue Note. That was my first “major” release and I really got a taste of the “good life,” so to speak. You’re doing headlining shows, on the cover of the jazz magazines and have people coming up to you on the subway like “Yo, I’m listening to you right now!” It’s easy to get used to that kind of treatment, but for most people it never lasts.
I produced my next three albums after that [Editor’s Note: Zigzagger released on Concord Records, while Fly Moon Die Soon and Midnight Crisp released on First Word Records], and being a jazz musician is a hustle, so when I was doing that I was also working on other genres and other people’s albums to make money, even though I just wanted to make my own sh*t. That was hard, and there came a point when I couldn’t write music anymore. I was in a bad slump, but I finally broke it in 2020, then put another album out in 2022. I’ve got an agency again, a label again, and feel like I’m really picking up steam.
This life [as a jazz musician] is one of peaks and valleys. It’s never an easy one, but the easy path usually isn’t worth walking. I know who I am, I know what I’m doing, and I feel like I’m the strongest musically I’ve ever been. Jose [James] and Blue Note gave me a gift in 2014, and I’m really seeing the rewards of that now, even more than I did back then. I’m so excited for my next album and everything coming up.
Have those learning experiences been your favorite part of the journey?
Absolutely. I look back at the hard times, when I was like “F*ck, I don’t know what to do.” I was always questioning myself. But it turns out that I needed that struggle. I needed to learn how to do more than just make the music, and I learned how to promote myself, take care of my band members, really hustle because you can’t afford to pay anyone to do that sh*t for you [laughs]. Those were such great learning experiences, and now I feel like I’m ready for anything. I’ve always been confident in my abilities, even in the rough times, but my manager and friends are like “Yo Tak, you’ve got a new confidence on this next album.” I’m ready for it, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.
Zach Littleton and Johny Lovan have been aware of each other’s existence since third grade in Bowling Green, Ky. — after all, Littleton “dated” Lovan’s sister in that era “mostly because we were both big redheads and everyone said we should,” he recalls. It took many years for them to start making music together, and even longer for them to realize they worked best as a duo, but since 2016, Sugadaisy has quietly built a substantial fanbase by simply being its weird, wonderful selves.
Indeed, Sugadaisy is no ordinary band, largely because Littleton and Lovan are no ordinary musicians. One of their songs (“Space Cadet”) has nearly two million listens on Spotify simply thanks to word of mouth and some love from high-trafficking YouTube creators. They’ve performed live in shirts and ties and with their heads covered in pantyhose. With tongue more often than not firmly in cheek, they’ve largely released tunes rooted in guitar-based folk and singer/songwriter fare, but they also have punk, hip-hop, Spanish, and math rock songs itching to emerge.
Boygenius have won their first Grammy awards. At the pre-show ceremony, they won the awards for Best Rock Performance and Best Rock Song for “Not Strong Enough”. They also won Best Alternative Music Album for The Record.
Earlier on in the afternoon, Phoebe Bridgers picked up her first win as a solo artist in Best Pop Duo/Group Performance for her featured spot on SZA’s “Ghost In The Machine.”
Boygenius were nominated for six total awards this year, including nods for Record Of The Year and Album Of The Year.
On Thursday night, Boygenius played two intimate acoustic shows at The Smell in Los Angeles, where they said that they were “going away for the foreseeable future.”
The queer supergroup — which includes singer-songwriters Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus — took home three Grammy awards during the pre-show on Sunday afternoon. The wins included trophies for best rock song and best rock performance for their single “Not Strong Enough,” as well as best alternative album for their debut studio album The Record.
Wearing matching white tuxedos, the trio literally ran to the stage to accept their first award, and delivered a heartfelt acceptance speech, even as music began to play them off the stage.
“We were all delusional enough as kids to think that this might happen to us someday,” Dacus said, holding her golden gramophone. “Phoebe would sing at Guitar Center hoping that she would get discovered. Julien was always in bands as a kid and wanted to play sold-out stadiums. And I would practice writing an acceptance speech and thank all of the people that have been nice to me, like my bus driver and the guy who held the door at church, so I feel kinda like a kid, because that was the last time that something like this felt possible. This just, like, isn’t real.”
After Dacus thanked the band, the orchestra flared up, but not before Baker was able to add to the speech. “Music saved my life,” Baker said. “Everyone can be in a band. This band is my family.” The trio adorably embraced as they left the stage, only to come back twice more to accept more awards, using their last speech of the pre-show to thank their families.
The debut collaborative album from New Orleans electro-revival dynamo Dawn Richard and multi-instrumentalist, producer, and composer Spencer Zahn, Pigments tells the story of finding oneself through dance, self-expression, and community through the lens of New Orleans’ contemporary arts scene. Not strictly neoclassical, jazz, or ambient electronic, the project is one long composition that flows through several “movements” guided by five lead instruments: clarinet, saxophone, guitar, strings, and Richard’s stripped-down vocals. Marking Richard’s first step into the contemporary classical world, Pigments reveals a new facet of her limitless talents and provides a fresh introduction to Zahn, whose intimate, sprawling soundscapes play with principles of open space and motion.
After first collaborating on “Cyanotype” (a song that originally appeared on Zahn’s 2018 debut album People of the Dawn), the two artists wanted to explore making a full-length project that would depart from the celebratory R&B and dance music that Richard is known for, yet keep in line with her love for the experimental and avant-garde. The story that emerged from the new songs was of “someone painting with broken brushes,” she explains. “I felt like the tools that I and other people like me were dealt weren’t shiny. Yet we still painted these beautiful pictures.”
“This album is what it means to be a dreamer and finally reach a place where you’ve decided to love the pigments that you have,” Richard continues. After Pigments flutters open with “Coral,” whose title indicates a solid thorniness, Richard’s voice enters on the second track “Sandstone,” which swells into hopeful fervor as she sings of wanting “to be ‘more than’” and claims her dreams as if they’re reality. The rest of the project snakes through the hypnotic “Vantablack,” whose lyrics about “losing myself in you” are about learning to love your skin as a Black woman, and then into the melancholic “Cerulean,” on which Richard rawly expresses sadness and rage, as she questions to the world, “Are you hurting/Are you hurting me?” Finally, the album funnels into the triumphant “Umber,” on which Richard boldly states her desire to make “real change” as she sings, “I’m gon’ climb this mountain/Till I reach the top.” All the lyrics are minimal and bare, allowing the listener to bring their own feelings and stories to the music.
As Richard’s lyrics outline this emotional journey, the rest of the narrative is told by the instruments that ebb and flow around her tender introspections. Though each instrument has its own theme, they modulate to the key that Dawn is singing in and “provide a new tonal center,” Zahn explains. Like on his 2020 album Sunday Painter, his approach to composition is informed by classic ECM productions and the solo work of Talk Talk’s Mark Hollis, but morphs to incorporate the energy of his collaborators. “I’m not the sole narrator,” Richard adds. “The composition is the story, and we’re just living inside its space.”
In recording, Zahn also focused on capturing the sound of the room and the breath of the players to foster a feeling of spaciousness, as well as acknowledge all the beings who contributed to Pigments. The musicians throughout include Stuart Bogie (clarinet, bass clarinet), Mike Haldeman (electric guitar, acoustic guitar, sampled electronic instruments), Malcolm Parson (cello, violin, viola), Dave Scalia (drums), Kirk Schoenherr (electric guitar), Jas Walton (tenor saxophone, flute), and Doug Wieselman (clarinet, bass clarinet). For Richard, the project as a whole feels like a tribute to her father Frank Richard, lead singer of the funk band Chocolate Milk, who received his master’s degree in classical music theory.
Ultimately, Pigments is a deeply empathetic and compassionate project that opens itself up to both individual reflection and communal connection. Through telling a personal story of resilience and self-actualization, Richard and Zahn create a site of healing and new possibilities for not only themselves, but also the musicians who played on the record, the dancers and crew who contributed to the film, and the listeners at home. “The point is that we’re going through the same thing in different ways,” Richard reflects. “No matter what walks of life we come from, the story can be similar.”
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SELECT PRESS PULL QUOTES:
“What a fascinating career Dawn Richard is carving out. With this week’s release of Pigments, her new collaborative album with producer and composer Spencer Zahn, the New Orleans singer-songwriter’s evolution from expressly commercial pop to avant-garde experimentalism is beginning to parallel Scott Walker’s in its unexpected audacity.” – Stereogum, Album of the Week
“Pigments represents a stylistic quantum leap.” – Stereogum, Album of the Week
“It all coheres loosely into a story that’s begging to be acted out on stage in fancy theaters and concert halls while this ensemble plays through the album.” – Stereogum, Album of the Week
“Dawn Richard is the physical embodiment of metamorphosis. Every step in her career path is an unexpected and unpredictable one, with each album release forming a winding road of new sonic thrills.” – Edition
“[Pigments] is more of a sonic escape, with weighty synths, classical strings and shadowy vocals that’ll drift you to a safe space.” – Edition “Here she is saying my black voice is now a classical voice too” – NPR Music
“[‘Vantablack’ is] an ode to brown skin and it’s rarity and it’s beauty” – NPR Music
“This is an album that really pulls at the emotions” – NPR Music
“Richard isn’t afraid to defy—or in this case, flat-out shatter—expectations.” – Bandcamp
“Pigments is genuinely unusual, in the most wonderful way. Not only does it offer a sharp contrast to Richard’s entire persona, it manages to inventively merge pop songwriting and classical traditions.” – Bandcamp
“If her previous albums proved Richard had the chops for a stadium tour, Pigments suggests that she’s just as ready for the opera house.” – Bandcamp
“[Pigments is] a lot more meditative than Dawn’s own albums, but her airy R&B/soul-infused vocals fit these songs perfectly. It toes the line between a pop-centric jazz album and an experimental pop album, and songs this purely gorgeous should appeal to fans all across that wide spectrum.” – Brooklyn Vegan
“Dawn Richard sidesteps into contemporary classical” – Pitchfork
“In this ECM and Talk Talk inspired collaborative album, the through-line from Richard’s catalog is her vanguard approach to composition and singing” – Pitchfork
“[Dawn & Spencer’s] team-up feels both exciting and natural” – The FADER
“Richard and Zahn paint Pigments with every color on their palettes, and the result is a celebration of art’s infinite possibilities.” – Paste
“Multi-instrumentalist, producer and composer [Spencer] Zahn conjures classical, jazz and ambient electronic soundscapes that fill meditative tracks like “Coral,” “Indigo,” “Opal” and “Cobalt” entirely, but Pigments is at its most potent when Richard’s vocals wander these sonic thickets, journeying in search of love and understanding.” – Paste
“each appearance [Dawn] makes is halting and deeply felt. Everything provided and guided by her partner coalesces into a quietly powerful flowing sequence.” – All Music
“Pigments is not necessarily built for movement, but it’s as moving as any of Richard’s previous output. No other album is quite like it.” – All Music
“Dawn Richard’s Journey From Bad Boy To Indie Pioneer Has Been A Creative Pilgrimage” – Okayplayer
“Pigments is yet another enjoyable showcase of how Richard can bend genres and create beautiful results in the process” – Okayplayer
“Second Line, parallels Pigments with both sounding like religious experiences, digging to the core of Richard as an artist and person.” – Spectrum Culture
“Zahn’s production works best when it has Richard to play off.” – Spectrum Culture
“’Cerulean’ [is] the album’s crown jewel and one of the best moments of musical catharsis in 2022.” – Spectrum Culture
“The album is a lush and vast instrumental work” – Spectrum Culture
“what the two do piece together within the movements of Pigments is, at times, an intimate internal struggle, but with Zahn’s help, it’s given the world-shattering stakes it deserves.” – Spectrum Culture
“a rolling soundscape of soft saxophone melodies, blooming string sections and shimmering ambiance as Richard’s vocals cut through the watercolored fog, floating in and out of focus as the album’s tide ebbs and flows.” – PAPER Magazine
“As Richard sings impressionistic songs of love (and self-love), Zahn’s radiant chamber music works like a prism, splitting her voice into beams of pure color.” – Pitchfork, Best New Music
“a remarkable endeavor, one that combines the properties of both artists’ music until it becomes a pristine, unified feeling.” – Pitchfork, Best New Music
UK foursome Folly Group found a gap in the market. Their sound is all their own: definitely experimental, kinda chaotic, and post… post-everything. You may question whether all of the elements within this crash-bang single belong together — it can have the impression of two different audio assets accidentally playing at once — but you keep your ears on the wider soundscape. The controlled-chaos effect is enhanced by a multi-screen music video that’ll properly scatter your brain. No pressure, just hit play.
The singer and guitarist socked away songs grappling with frustration, pain and love during the pandemic. They became her powerful second solo LP, “What Now.”
When Brittany Howard was 17, she lived alone, in a haunted house in Athens, Ala., that had belonged to her great-grandmother.
At first, she was thrilled. Alabama Shakes, the band she’d started with her high school classmate Zac Cockrell, practiced there. Then doors started to open on their own. Cabinets slammed shut. One day, Howard was outside the back door when she heard the lock slide closed on the inside. Thinking someone had broken in, she crept into the kitchen and grabbed a weapon she kept behind her fridge.
“I had this machete, and I’m clearing rooms in the house like I’m Bruce Willis in ‘Pulp Fiction,’” she said on an afternoon in early January. “There’s nobody in the house.”
After seven years, Howard abandoned the old, run-down duplex, but she has long maintained a connection to the ghosts of her past, and her music has often felt haunted. The Shakes were imbued with the essence of artists who preceded them by a few generations — Otis Redding, Janis Joplin, Curtis Mayfield — and shaped by an American South that sometimes struggled to look forward instead of back. In 2019, after two albums, and just as the band appeared poised for superstardom, Howard walked away, releasing “Jaime,” a solo debut named after her late sister.
On Feb. 9, she returns with “What Now,” an album filled with wailing soul, jittery funk and buzzing grooves born of frustration, pain, love and intense questioning. Its roots can be traced to the pandemic, and another house Howard believed might be haunted: a big 100-year-old yellow rental filled with antique furniture in East Nashville.
“I came by this album pretty honest,” Howard, 35, said while sitting at a desk at the Sound Emporium in Nashville, the studio where she recorded it. She wore a gray button-down, white sneakers and rings on most of her fingers. She has spent nearly all her life in the South but in 2019 was living in New Mexico with her wife, the singer-songwriter Jesse Lafser. As Howard was getting ready to release “Jaime,” their marriage was coming apart.
“I got divorced and drove back to Nashville,” Howard said. “I was like, ‘Man, I thought I was through with this place.’” In March 2020, she was preparing for a European tour when the pandemic scotched those plans. It was just as well. After nearly a decade of writing, recording and touring, Howard was burned out.
“I was in the house, excited not to have to be a musician and just be a human washing groceries,” she said. “I was hiking, fishing, outside every day. I was listening to Stevie Wonder’s ‘Songs in the Key of Life’ to keep my mood up. I finished all of ‘Tiger King.’ Then I ran out of stuff to do. I got to a point where I was like, ‘What am I for?’”
She set up a bare-bones studio in a small spare bedroom. “I’d just go in there and make whatever I was feeling that day,” Howard said. She didn’t think the songs would ever see the light of day.
It wasn’t until she revisited them a couple of years later that she realized what she had. “This album, for me, was just a series of journal entries,” she said. “Because it was the pandemic, my heart was going through so many things. There was all this sorrow about seeing the world on fire, seeing people the same color as you getting beaten in the streets. On the other hand, I was falling in love.”
The joy of this new relationship was shaded not only by the darkness of the world around her, but also by the specter of past romantic failures. “There was a lot of fear,” Howard said. “What if this happens again? What if they don’t like me like that? Why can’t I enjoy this? All that had to go somewhere.”
The songs aren’t really about Lafser or any other former partners. They aren’t even about Howard’s new relationship at the time, which ended before the album was finished. The songs are about Howard, herself. “I’m the common denominator,” she said.
AFTER THE STUDIO visit, Howard walked into the living room of her latest house — a well-appointed but unassuming midsize home in East Nashville — and was besieged by her small, feisty dogs, Wilma and Wanda. The room felt like a display case for Howard’s enthusiasms. A wooden chess board sat atop a baby grand piano. “Sister Outsider,” a collection of essays by the queer Black feminist poet Audre Lorde, was on the coffee table. Tucked into a corner was a photo of Howard with the Obamas. A sitar case leaned against the credenza housing her record player. A giant portrait of the Supremes dominated one wall.
“It’s from the first gay club in Nashville,” Howard said. “I’m just borrowing it because the person who owns it doesn’t have tall enough ceilings.”
Howard bought the home from the singer-songwriter Vanessa Carlton and her husband, John McCauley, of the band Deer Tick. Behind the house, between an old fishing boat Howard rebuilt and an archery target shaped like a deer head — “I have strange hobbies,” she noted, walking through the backyard — was a garage that had been converted into a home studio. Howard finished recording the “What Now” demos in this comfortably disheveled space with guitars adorning the walls, a movie screen hanging from the ceiling and a sauna beside the door.
“You’ve got to have a sauna in your studio,” she said. “To sweat it out.”
A small control room was dominated by a large vintage mixing board once used to record Prince’s debut album. Howard is a huge fan, and apparently the feeling was mutual. In 2015, he invited her and the Shakes to play at Paisley Park, and joined them on guitar for “Gimme All Your Love.” One of the new songs, the dynamic, tempo-shifting “Power to Undo,” feels animated by his spirit.
“When I was making it, I was like, ‘Prince would’ve liked this,’” Howard said. The song, she explained, is about trying to leave someone who keeps coming back. “There’s a part of you that’s like, ‘I kind of do want to go back,’ and then the older, wiser part that’s like, ‘Don’t you dare.’”
“What Now” feels like a breakup album, albeit one tinged less with bitterness for her exes and more with a harsh lens turned on herself. “Out there, there’s a love waiting for me,” Howard sings on the opener, “Earth Sign,” her voice floating over spare, ethereal piano chords. “I can feel, I can’t see/But will I know when I feel it?”
Howard produced the album alongside Shawn Everett, who engineered “Jaime” and the second Shakes album, “Sound & Color.” He recalled that “Earth Sign” was a spare 30-second demo when Howard brought it into the studio.
“One day, she was like, ‘Just give me the drums,’” Everett said. “Then without any chords even being there, she put this insanely complex harmony over the whole thing.”
Everett, who has worked with Adele, the Killers and John Legend, was taken aback. “The amount of singers able to build a complex ocean of harmonies without any chord progression is almost zero,” he said. “Then she sat there composing this beautiful piano arrangement. Some studied musician could maybe figure that out, but she just does it by feeling.” The resulting vibe is simultaneously hopeful and despairing, setting a tone for the album.
From song to song, the album approximates the emotional whiplash of falling in and out of love. “The best time that I ever had/That’s when the worst times started,” Howard sings on the humid, stuttering “Red Flags,” a track about careening into new relationships. “I wanted to talk about how I just let my heart rule everything,” she said. “When I feel love, I’m going in that direction. It’s like, ‘Honey, that’s not a parade! That’s danger!’”
For “Samson,” a hypnotic meditation on a dying union, she came into the studio with 16 bars of a drumbeat, some keyboard chords and a few lyrics. Working with Everett, she began to color in the rest, cutting, chopping and mixing in elements including a winding muted trumpet melody by the Nashville-based jazz artist Rod McGaha. As the deadline loomed, the lyrics remained unfinished. “I just made them up in real time,” she said. “The vocals on it are live. The way I sung it, it’s like you’ve been wrung out.”
The effect is devastating. The singer-songwriter Becca Mancari, one of Howard’s closest friends, recalled when Howard first played her a rough mix, in her car one night in Nashville. “I started tearing up,” she said. “I have chills thinking about it now. I remember being like, ‘This is my friend tapping into the ancestors.’”
Mancari introduced Howard to her current partner, Anna-Maria Babcock, when Howard was selling merch at one of Mancari’s shows. “When they saw each other, I felt this energetic wash,” Mancari remembered.
Amid all the tumult and heartache, “What Now” offers moments to dance through the tears. “It feels like this liberated, queer Black music,” Mancari said. “You could hear these songs in a queer club, which I’d never thought about a Brittany song.”
“What Now” doesn’t sound too much like what Howard has done before. As Cockrell, who played bass on both of Howard’s solo albums, put it: “The songs are all very different, but I can hear elements of Brittany in all of it.”
Considering her previous successes — five Grammys, a Billboard No. 1 album, multiple performances at the White House — Howard’s refusal to repeat herself is refreshingly risky. Although she has never closed the door on another Alabama Shakes album, she is committed to her own restlessness. “There are so many interesting things about music,” she said. “Why just do one of them?”
Howard credits therapy for helping her navigate her emotional life, understand her ghosts and channel it all into art. “Therapy has made my life bearable,” she said. It has also clarified her goals. She has a remarkably detailed vision of a not-too-distant future when she would like to be effectively retired, playing music only when and how she wants.
“I want a farm with animals somewhere in the South, an orchard to grow plums, a five-acre pond, a golden retriever and maybe some kids,” she said. “I want to grow food in my backyard, and have this big barn with three doors, where my studio equipment is, a place for my hobbies. I can woodwork and do whatever weird projects I’m into. And I want one of them four-by-four vehicles.”
As to whether she can imagine growing old with someone else in that picture, notwithstanding her current happiness, those old ghosts breed skepticism.
The Jesus And Mary Chain’s Jim Read speaks to MOJO about the band’s new album Glasgow Eyes, intra-band brawling, booze and destroying the myth of the Mary Chain.
“WE LOVE doing what we do,” TheJesus And Mary Chain singer Jim Reid tells MOJO from his home in Devon. “But we’re so fucking lazy. We were back in the ’80s, and we were in the ’90s. It gets to a point where you just think, You have to get up off your arse and do something.”
He’s talking about the group’s new LP Glasgow Eyes, their first since 2017’s Damage And Joy, which arrives in March, its title inspired by brother William’s sleeve image.
“A good chunk” was done shortly before Covid hit. With various pieces later recorded by Jim in Devon and William at home in Arizona, a breakthrough accompanied a move to Mogwai’s Castle Of Doom studio, a former Victorian bank in Finnieston, early in 2023.
“It’s a fantastic studio and a lovely building,” says Reid. “I kept saying, The control room’s like the Starship Enterprise or something, I felt like Captain Kirk in this big revolving chair in front of this control console. The gear they’ve got in there is just incredible. From about February onwards ’til about May, it was pretty intensive. It had been a bit bitty, just sketches and stuff, and it wasn’t until we hit Glasgow that it really started to feel like a record – like, Hey, it’s the Mary Chain!”
There’ll be people who want to kill us for destroying the myth of the Mary Chain
Jim Reid
He admits his idea of the group in 2024 may not be the same as everybody else’s. “There’s a lot of electronic sounds on it,” Jim says. “I mean, some of William’s guitar playing, I think, veers into jazz almost. It’s the Mary Chain gone experimental, I suppose. To me, it just sounds like the Mary Chain, but, as usual, there’ll be people that are totally satisfied and gloriously happy with it, and, if you look on these little social media threads, there’ll be people who want to kill us for destroying the myth of the Mary Chain. It’s hard. We like it, and if people get into it, as our old American manager used to say (adopts raspy, seen-it-all voice), ‘Hey, that’s gravy!’”
The siblings’ famously combustive interactions are also examined. Lead single Jamcod (that’s JAMC-O.D., rather than ‘Jam Cod’ as BBC 6Music had it) relates to William’s departure after a disastrous 15-minute show at Los Angeles’ House Of Blues in September 1998.
“So many people ask about that night that the shit hit the fan and it all blew up that I just thought, Let’s put it in a song and maybe they’ll stop asking,” says Jim. “We found out where the boundaries were then, that if you step over that line, it’s going to be World War Three, and there was World War Three in the ’90s. Now I know that if I say certain things, there will be consequences, and so does he, so when it’s getting a bit heated, we’ll just back off, give each other a bit of space.
“The problem lies when it comes to drinking and stuff like that,” he goes on. “Because once you start drinking, all of that seems like a good idea. There are pretty heated arguments when we’ve both had a couple of jars. I was drinking during the recording of this record and I’ve since stopped again… you’ve still got your eye on that line in the sand and you know that if you step over it, there’s going to be trouble. We’re sitting on top of Guy Fawkes’ barrels of dynamite, smoking cigars, thinking, Fuck, we better be careful. Because I know what can happen.”
THAT SAID, Jim acknowledges the creative fuel provided by extreme experience, even if it is retrospective. “I’m sitting on my couch wearing a pair of slippers with daytime TV on mute right now,” he says. “I mean, that doesn’t make for a great song. So thinking back to the times where it was like, you get up in the morning and the day was successful if I hooked up with somebody who was going to sell me drugs… you were basically acting totally on instinct, and it was all about getting drugs. The humanity got sucked out for a while, I suppose – the idea of drugs and glamour is totally a myth. So that was [album track] Chemical Animal.”
Songs including The Eagles And The Beatles and Hey Lou Reid are, hears MOJO, for William to explain. “A lot of these songs are just like us looking back on times gone by, to the period before the band,” says Jim, “when we were looking for an inroad, to get the band together.” Elsewhere, Fay Fife from The Rezillos guests on Venal Joy, and Jim’s girlfriend Rachel Conte duets with him on Girl 71.
While the album creation process is a painful one (“I have to say I hate it”), it’s balanced with positivity. “When you go into a studio and make a record, it’s like you’re trying to will about 25 butterflies into a jar with your mind control,” Jim says. “You’re thinking, Is this happening? And then the fucking butterflies just land in the jar one day, and you’re like, Wow, we’ve done that, again! There’s something vaguely magical about making a record – at the end, when you’re playing it back, you think, Well… here we are again.”
Fruition’s three-part harmonies and impromptu performances captivated crowds on street corners and in campgrounds in the Pacific Northwest initially, but their remarkable 15-year journey has seen them emerge as a singular force in the world of Americana on some of the nation’s biggest stages. Channeling the delicate, playful, and honest focus on songcraft and vocal harmony of groups like the Beatles and CSNY, the band continues to create timeless and genuine folk, roots, and rock ‘n roll.
Distinguished by three accomplished songwriters and a rhythm section that serves each song with a finely tuned attention to detail and aesthetic, Fruition manages to consistently release a body of work that is both uniquely their own and instantly familiar. 2024 will see them release a brand new studio album, while preparing a 2nd album for 2025 and a full complement of festival and headline touring.
Let’s get this out of the way first: You will not find Taylor Swift or Beyoncé on this list. Yes, many members of the Pitchfork staff attended the Eras Tour and the Renaissance Tour and had incredible, even life-changing, experiences there. But we coveredthoseworld-conqueringphenomenaextensively enough already this year. So for our final staff list of 2023, we thought we’d turn our attention to some other favorite concerts. Here, you’ll find everything from Sweeping Promises in a tiny venue in Minneapolis to SZA at Madison Square Garden, Water From Your Eyes on a boat to Floating Points and Shabaka Hutchings at the Hollywood Bowl. Let the FOMO begin…
Feist
Brooklyn Steel; Brooklyn, NYMay 14
Feist started her Multitudes show with a reassuring smile as she filmed the audience while walking among them; she ended it with her eyes closed, caught in a reverie, her silhouette repeated to dreamy infinity on a curtain behind her. In between, she reminded us why she remains one of the most arresting performers of the 2000s indie boom. It was part solo high-wire act, as she stood alone on a stage in the middle of the crowd, mixing her bittersweet acoustic songs with charming banter that made you feel like you were catching up with an old friend. It was part clattering rock show, as she led a full band and the audience through communal catharsis. It was part DIY multimedia experiment, adorned with abstract visuals that were created in-the-moment. There was some sleight-of-hand in the form of a mysterious journal filled with casually profound poetry. There were yelps for songs that soundtracked past lives. There were tears at this Mother’s Day show, too, when Feist talked about her young daughter and the ever-upward branches of family. The whole thing allowed onlookers to live in a limbo between raw emotion and premeditated performance for a couple of hours, a magical suspension of belief. –Ryan Dombal
After a stellar and bittersweet last-ever set from local punks Green/Blue, Sweeping Promises’ show at 7th St Entry, the tiny venue attached to the historic First Avenue club, began inconspicuously. Lira Mondal quietly sang the opening lines of “Eraser,” the first track of their latest album, Good Living Is Coming for You, before belting at full volume. Good Living is an album with built-in lo-fi muffle, but with no distance at all between audience and band, everything became infinitely more powerful: the bass grooves, Caulfield Schnug’s guitar solos, and more than anything, Mondal’s extremely powerful voice. The show happened days after the mass shooting at the Minneapolis DIY venue Nudieland, and the band, which came up through a similar network of DIY scenes and punk house shows, paid a solemn tribute between songs. It was a great performance for a community that needed to experience loud, excellent music together in a small room. –Evan Minsker
