No Trace Evidence is a short mini-documentary of Kiwi Jr’s recording process during the Summer of Covid 19, a candid peak into the recording studio as well as al fresco out-door mixing, isolation booths, temperature checks and black cats crossing their path.
Self-released internationally in January 2020, Kiwi Jr.’s Football Money was a critical smash, earning 4 and 5 star rave reviews. Primed for the buzz of a UK tour, festivals and SxSW, Covid 19 pulled the carpet out from under the bands’ plans. But just as suddenly, out of the blue, a record offer arrived via email from Sub Pop Records who had not yet seen, met or spoken to the band.
Pandemic-be-damned, Kiwi Jr. recorded their second album Cooler Returns in July, and full-speed ahead, released the first single in September and the album in January 2021, again to critical accolades and the praise of indie rock connoisseurs.
With Toronto in and out of lock-downs, slow vaccine rollout and the finger-pointing of Ontario Pandemic Politics, the band wonder will they ever tour?
Directed by Sean Egerton Foreman, who previously shot the bands’ videos for “Cooler Returns”, “Maid Marion’s Toast” and “Gimme More”.
Beginning on September 10th, Kiwi Jr will embark on a 9+ dates EU tour, with live performances at this year’s Waves Festival and additional shows in Vienna, Amsterdam, Manchester, London, Paris and Luxembourg (See below for full list of dates.)
Today, May 11th, 2021, marks the return of Shannon Lay with the official video for “Rare to Wake,” a gorgeous new single which is now available at all DSPs, and first material since the release of August, her acclaimed 2019 label debut.
Shannon says of “Rare to Wake”: “Change is a constant in every aspect of our experience yet sometimes it is difficult to accept. Without change we cannot become who we are meant to be and with change comes the upheaval and transformation of who we were. There is an inevitable discomfort that comes with challenging the environments, roles and identities we embody throughout our lives. Trust that part of yourself that knows you’re on the right track, even when it’s challenging. That trust and love helps to guide and reassure us as we explore new realms.
Wherever you are in your adventures let this song be a reminder to never be afraid to receive and accept the changes that beckon you to grow and evolve. Allow yourself to awaken and embrace your many destinies. When your heart feels heavy ask yourself what needs to be cleared out. That new found space will be occupied by something better, something brighter, something that lifts you up; make way.” You can watch the new video for “Rare to Wake” which was directed by Kai MacKnight by clicking here.
What people are saying about Shannon Lay’s August: “A quiet resolve underlies the folk singer’s mesmeric Sub Pop debut, which is her sunniest and most intrepid.” - Pitchfork
“Both bracing and enticing, as she invites you into her world but doesn’t let you get too comfortable (8/10).” - Uncut
“August feels like the product of a wandering mind deliberately slipping through the cracks” ★★★★ - Mojo
“Blissful but measured, pretty but also in possession of a soothing plainness.” ★★★★ - Q
“Shannon Lay lives in the real world even as she’s fascinated with all that is not obvious to us, and she’s rarely in better form than on August.” ★★★★- All Music
“Captures the artist’s pure joy in committing her life to music… exudes warmth and love, with empowering poetry sung along to creative updates on folk tropes.” -The Line Of Best Fit
Iron & Wine worked with noted multimedia artist Steven Dufala for the video to lead track, “This Solemn Day.” The song’s bare-bones approach to storytelling comes to life as Dufala creates a world of sophisticated simplicity. Using stop motion animation, paper sculptures, and a bit of drawing, the video unfolds with a hypnotic charm carrying you through small town U.S.A. in new and unique ways.
The team behind the video includes animator Josh Coll and cinematographer Drew Saracco, and was produced by Laris Kreslins and All Ages Productions.
Tallahassee documents a window of time (1998-99) in which Iron & Wine’s Sam Beam would make his very first musical recordings while attending Florida State University’s College of Motion Picture Arts. Upon graduation Beam would move to Miami and begin writing new songs utilizing a four-track recorder to make The Creek Drank the Cradle, which would come out three years later.
The songs captured in that house on St. Augustine’s in Tallahassee - preserved on a hard drive by roommate, Tallahassee engineer and one time Iron & Wine band member EJ Holowicki – went largely forgotten for over 20 years.
Beam reflected by stating: “These songs are my first musical recordings. Listening back to these songs, I sometimes hear my younger self trying timidly to imitate musical heroes like Neil Young or Jason Molina with revealing affection. Other times, I hear the room where my friend EJ and I recorded and can easily picture it in my mind. I made many lasting friendships in that time of my life and all their faces come back to me too. One of my very favorite things about music is its powerful connection to memory. Mostly when I hear these songs, I just remember the joy that came with taking these first baby steps…Hope you enjoy them!”
Tallahassee is the fifth entry in the ongoing Iron & Wine Archive Series. It is available on LP/CD/CS/DSPs from Sub Pop. The limited Loser edition on yellow-splattered vinyl is still available at megamart.subpop.com, select independent retailers in North America, the U.K. , and EU (while supplies last).
Iron & Wine Archive Series Volume No.5: Tallahassee
Tracklisting: 1. Why Hate the Winter 2. This Solemn Day 3. Loaning Me Secrets 4. John’s Glass Eye 5. Calm on the Valley 6. Ex-Lover Lucy Jones 7. Elizabeth 8. Show Him the Ground 9. Straight and Tall 10. Cold Town 11. Valentine
Today, Sub Pop releases Indian Yard, the debut record from Sitka, Alaska project Ya Tseen. Galanin began working on the record in 2017 while going back and forth between his home in Sitka and Juneau, Alaska where he was carving a totem pole. The album entwines falling in love and the birth of a child with the urgency of current social and environmental justice movements to tear down destructive systems and build anew. He shared the concepts with bandmates Zak D. Wass and Otis Calvin III and together they structured the album alongside longtime collaborator Benjamin Verdoes. Through sessions in Sitka and Seattle, a cast of brilliant friends—Shabazz Palaces, Nick Hakim, fellow Indigenous Alaskan singer and songwriter Qacung, to name a few—helped form Indian Yard into a cataract of intensely current pop wonders.
His debut as Ya Tseen (“be alive,” and a reference to his Tlingit name Yeil Ya Tseen) is Indian Yard, his first album for Sub Pop. Rich with emotional range and sharp awareness, Indian Yard explores love, desire, frustration, pain, revolution, and connection through magnetic expressions of an Indigenous mind and body. The lusty electro-soul cascade of “Close the Distance,” the lithe funk frolic of “Get Yourself Together,” the insistent weight of “Back in That Time,” sung in Yupik: These 11 tracks put Galanin, Ya Tseen, and Indigenous art at large in a current musical conversation with the likes of Moses Sumney and TV on the Radio, FKA Twigs, and James Blake.
Indian Yard is a profound record of liberation and an implicit act of protest, making its case by facing the intersection of past, present, and future realities. In a nod to Sun Ra, “Gently To The Sun” mentions “meds for a nightmare”—an apt description for a record that offers a much-needed antidote for what now ails us personally and universally.
This is not, by any means, Galanin’s first album. He has released a steady stream of records under a panoply of aliases, including Silver Jackson and Indian Agent. He has worked with the likes of Meshell Ndegeocello, Tanya Tagaq, and Samantha Crain. And for the better part of a decade, he’s also been part of the revolutionarily borderless art collective Black Constellation alongside Shabazz Palaces and THEESatisfaction (read full bio at Sub Pop).
Indian Yard can be purchased on CD/LP through Sub Pop. LPs purchased through megamart.subpop.com, select independent retailers in North America, the U.K., and Europe will receive the standard LP on black vinyl. The North American deluxe edition on clear vinyl is now available for preorder. The deluxe packaging will include a 24-page hardcover LP-sized book with covers featuring a sci-fi landscape populated by a toddler-wearing artist Merritt Johnson’s sculpture Mindset, a VR headset woven from sweetgrass. The interior art was designed by Galanin. This deluxe edition will be available while supplies last.
Ya Tseen’s Nicholas Galanin is one of the most vital voices in contemporary art. His work spans sculpture, video, installation, photography, jewelry, and music; advocating for Indigenous sovereignty, racial, social, and environmental justice, for present, and future generations. For Galanin, memory and land are inevitably entwined. His most recent installation for Desert X 2021, on view through May 16, 2021, entitled Never Forget has garnered international media acclaim including from outlets such as The New York Times, TheLos Angeles Times, The Desert Sun, Galerie Magazine, and Time Out. The 45-foot letters of Never Forget reference the Hollywood sign, which initially spelled out HOLLYWOODLAND and was erected to promote a whites-only development. Its timing coincided with a development in Palm Springs that also connected to the film industry: Studio contracts limited actors’ travel, contributing to the city’s rise as a playground and refuge of the stars. Meanwhile, the white settler mythology of America as the land of the free, home of the brave was promoted in the West, and the landscape was cinematized through the same lens. Never Forget asks settler landowners to participate in the work by transferring land titles and management to local Indigenous communities. The work is a call to action and a reminder that land acknowledgments become only performative when they do not explicitly support the land back movement. Not only does the work transmit a shockwave of historical correction, but also promises to do so globally through social media. In connection with this installation, Galanin has organized a Go Fund Me account to benefit the Native American Land Conservancy (NALC.) You can contribute here.
What people are saying about Indian Yard: “a rich listen, strengthened by Galanin’s burning focus on critical issues” - [ 8/10] Uncut
“A widescreen epic of joyous, synth-driven indie-pop, electro-soul and borderless beats. […] An artist who refuses to be hemmed in.” - WePresent
“Indian Yard is every bit as multi-layered and multi-faceted a listen as Galanin’s artistic take on the world promised” - Loud & Quiet
Ya Tseen Indian Yard
Tracklisting: 1. Knives (feat. Portugal. The Man) 2. Light the Torch 3. Born into Rain (feat. Rum.gold and Tunia) 4. At Tugáni 5. Get Yourself Together 6. Close the Distance 7. We Just Sit and Smile Here in Silence 8. A Feeling Undefined (fat. Nick Hakim and Iska Dhaaf) 9. Synthetic Gods (feat. Shabazz Palaces and Stas THEE Boss) 10. Gently to the Sun (feat. Tay Sean) 11. Back in That Time (feat. Qacung)
Tomorrow, April 30th Sub Pop will release Indian Yard, the debut record from Sitka, Alaska project Ya Tseen. To celebrate the group’s impending release, they have shared an official video for the previously released song “Synthetic Gods,” directed by Stephan Gray. Hinging on verses from Shabazz Palaces and Stas THEE Boss, “Synthetic Gods” is sonically seductive, a tense reflection on crisis that summons the pressure needed to ensure Indigenous sovereignty and power to the people.
Galanin says of the video,” Synthetic Gods is a response to the violence of capitalism dependent on systemic racism and division; and a narration of the pressure that will be applied to destroy it.” You can watch the new video here.
The North American deluxe edition on clear vinyl is now available for preorder. The deluxe packaging will include a 24-page hardcover LP-sized book with covers featuring a sci-fi landscape populated by a toddler-wearing artist Merritt Johnson’s sculpture Mindset, a VR headset woven from sweetgrass. The interior art was designed by Galanin. This deluxe edition will be available while supplies last.
Ya Tseen’s Nicholas Galanin is one of the most vital voices in contemporary art. His work spans sculpture, video, installation, photography, jewelry, and music; advocating for Indigenous sovereignty, racial, social, and environmental justice, for present, and future generations. For Galanin, memory and land are inevitably entwined. His most recent installation for Desert X 2021, on view through May 16, 2021, entitled Never Forget has garnered international media acclaim including from outlets such as The New York Times, TheLos Angeles Times, The Desert Sun, Galerie Magazine, and Time Out. The 45-foot letters of Never Forget reference the Hollywood sign, which initially spelled out HOLLYWOODLAND and was erected to promote a whites-only development. Its timing coincided with a development in Palm Springs that also connected to the film industry: Studio contracts limited actors’ travel, contributing to the city’s rise as a playground and refuge of the stars. Meanwhile, the white settler mythology of America as the land of the free, home of the brave was promoted in the West, and the landscape was cinematized through the same lens. Never Forget asks settler landowners to participate in the work by transferring land titles and management to local Indigenous communities. The work is a call to action and a reminder that land acknowledgments become only performative when they do not explicitly support the land back movement. Not only does the work transmit a shockwave of historical correction, but also promises to do so globally through social media. In connection with this installation, Galanin has organized a Go Fund Me account to benefit the Native American Land Conservancy (NALC.) You can contribute here.
What people are saying about Indian Yard: “a rich listen, strengthened by Galanin’s burning focus on critical issues” - [ 8/10] Uncut
“A widescreen epic of joyous, synth-driven indie-pop, electro-soul and borderless beats. […] An artist who refuses to be hemmed in.” - WePresent
“Indian Yard is every bit as multi-layered and multi-faceted a listen as Galanin’s artistic take on the world promised” - Loud & Quiet
