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Back today with second single "Firewood" from The Clearwater Swimmers beautifully formed self-titled debut LP, out October 4 this year. "Firewood" is an eerie and melancholy song that highlights Sumner Bright's unique vocal tone and melodic style.
The other thing I really love about this track is the way Sumner's vocals and the band's churning rock music exist together, the gentleness of the vocal and the intensity of the backing music. They complement one another so well and give the song a kind of mystery.
Quote from the band: A song about the end of the world, really, and dread of catastrophes. It deals in the hanging-by-a-thread feeling of being frightened of your own environment, and also the relief that can be provided by somebody or something to cling on to.
A song about the end of the world, really, and dread of catastrophes. It deals in the hanging-by-a-thread feeling of being frightened of your own environment, and also the relief that can be provided by somebody or something to cling on to.
Songwriter Sumner Bright has released solo music under the moniker "twitches" for a while, but it's rare for me to get a debut record like this one from a band with a sound that feels so lived-in and established. One writer I shared it with early called it "a distorto-Americana Galaxie 500" and I can't get that out of my head so I'm leaving it here for you. To me it recalls Ghosts of the Great Highway era Sun Kil Moon - melancholy, mysterious, capable of blown out electric guitars that don't break the mood, poised and distinctive vocals singing melodies that always feel a little bit elusive, like they're just smoke curling up from a fire.
The Clearwater Swimmers self-titled debut is, at its core, a collection of field notes exploring gratitude, and how to shape it into a salve, armor, and engine. With songwriting often invoking themes of the natural world, community, and the spaces between, this album deals in the components a person is made up of: millions of small, fleeting moments, experiences, people, feelings - some painful, and some soothing. As much as the lyrics are autobiographical, they are just as much a letter to the threads that comprise the group, what ties them together, and what extends beyond.
Born from a stack of cassettes with one-take acoustic demos, the songs of Maine-born Sumner Bright (guitar and vocals) found their way to full-band fruition by way of friendly encouragement from friends and bandmates, Sander Casale (guitar), Timothy Graff (drums & percussion) and Connor Kennedy (bass and vocals). After relocating to Queens, Bright began to write simple, raw one-mic demos that served as exercises to ground himself in that which comprises him, and began to publish them discreetly online. After initially being approached by Casale to give these songs a full-band treatment, they decided to form a group for a short tour across the northeast, and quickly found themselves in a strong and rewarding creative dynamic.
They took this dynamic and wasted no time - immediately booking studio time in May of 2024 to record their full-length debut album at Big Nice Studio in Providence, RI with Bradford Krieger. They arrived at the studio and once again leaned on the effortless flow of the group, live-tracking and finishing the album in just 3 days. With the members of the band scattered across all the northeast, they come together in waves for shows, tours, or grill-outs and trips to the beach.
Clandestine was founded in 2010 by the owners of Northern Spy Records to help like-minded labels and artists release and promote their music. Today, we’ve expanded to include a team of project managers, sales experts, manufacturing specialists, and publicists who bring decades of music and label experience to bear for our clients. We specialize in the marketing and distribution of experimental and adventurous music and, in the last fourteen years, have helped release over one thousand albums.
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