Robert Earl Thomas on Facebook | Robert Earl Thomas on Twitter | Robert Earl Thomas on Instagram | Robert Earl Thomas on Bandcamp

There are a million songs dressed in white t-shirts and American denim, songs that drift through open spaces in some busted sedan, over lost highways that become tributaries to eventual static, crawling traffic and stifling density. There are a million more songs about being wild and green in the cities and outside them: a song about love for every person on this earth. Another Age, the debut album from Robert Earl Thomas, avoids inhabiting these clichés even as it embraces their personal influence, distilling plucky observations and reveries into something both universal and specific. This is an album about small moments with big emotional footprints, told humbly and honestly.

It’s a debut that plays the part without succumbing to it, more pastel romantic comedy than sepia historic drama. Thomas addresses with uncommon gentleness his own pet preoccupations with iconic imagery and tones: there are stylistic nods to Springsteen and Dire Straits, Arthur Russell’s more folk-leaning output, the various collaborations of Tom Petty & Jeff Lynne. But Thomas seems intent on conveying his specific take on these things over emulating them; you get the impression that he’s just as inspired by karaoke renditions of “I’m On Fire” or “Romeo and Juliet” as he is by the originals. As a narrator, he steers a road song away from jaded indifference, and his self-aware ballads are concerned not with broken hearts (or breaking them) but with city-induced anxiety, complex and unfamiliar love, and soft ruminations on getting older.

Thomas is not new to making records, and Another Age is actually years in the works. A founding member of Brooklyn-based indie outfit Widowspeak, he’s previously lent his talents as a lead guitarist to that band as well as the experimental pop group Vensaire. He began writing and home-recording songs two years ago, gradually and purposefully in moments of solitude between tours, between stints working in a Seattle woodshop and at a hotel in the Catskills, and during weeks couch-surfing back and forth across Brooklyn. For Another Age, Thomas combined these intricately layered demos with tracks from a two-week studio session in the winter of 2016 at Marcata Recording in New Paltz, NY with producer Kevin McMahon (Swans, Real Estate, Widowspeak).

Sonically, the album is buoyant throughout, even at its most emotive. There’s an inherent sense of approachability to his melodies and, as a frontman, Thomas is sincere and affable. He coaxes the listener in with idiosyncratic vulnerability, like a lounge singer raised on AM radio and Elliott Smith singing bedroom arena rock without the bravado, easy-listening with a little more at stake. His voice is distinctive, confident even as it wavers and slides through lyrics, lending a poignant sensitivity to his otherwise assertive guitar and synth compositions. Thomas excels in the sort of wandering, hypnotic codas that instantly recall a feeling of aloneness, a feeling of sequestering oneself to a closet-sized bedroom even as the city keeps moving around you.

And the stories he tells are full of intimate moments and observations: a walk home from a lover’s apartment, a long night drive back upstate, a quiet Wednesday morning existential crisis. Musings as to the significance of a Winona Ryder portrait on the wall of a stranger’s bedroom. The sense of discovery that comes with being young in a city with a new person, and the sense of loss when that novelty is gone. Another Age is indoor music at its most expansive, rock and roll held at arm’s length.

Zachary Cale Official Website | Zachary Cale on Facebook | Zachary Cale on Twitter | Zachary Cale on Instagram

Zachary Cale is a NYC based songwriter/musician originally hailing from the small town of Enon, Louisiana. His music ranges from lyrically driven balladry over American Primitive-inspired guitar playing to Cosmic Country music and cerebral Folk Rock.

For the past decade Cale has been releasing records under his own name via a number of labels including his own imprint All Hands Electric. His latest album Duskland was released in 2015 on No Quarter to critical acclaim.

Quicksilver Daydream Official Website | Quicksilver Daydream on Facebook | Quicksilver Daydream on Twitter | Quicksilver Daydream on Bandcamp | Quicksilver Daydream on Instagram

Quicksilver Daydream is a psychedelic-folk band comprised of Adam Lytle, Alex Bayer, Alf Lenni Erlandsen, Brett Banks, and Glenn Forsythe.

Their recordings paint sweeping, symbolic landscapes, conjuring worlds that vibrate between the hallucinatory and nostalgic. The band draws from a deep pool of influences, owing as much to early psychedelic pioneers Pearls Before Swine as they do to the compositions of Ennio Morricone.

The Brooklyn-based band released their debut LP Echoing Halls in June 2017. A collection of songs the press called “a web of folk grace and psych theatricality, a spinning whirlwind of gothic intentions and languid melodies” (Pickard, Nooga.com) and “a tour-de-force psychedelic outing…tinged with glimpses of sunshine” (Matteo, ScenesMedia.com).

Fly Oblivion, Quicksilver Daydream’s sophomore LP was co-produced by the band and Jonathan Schenke (Parquet Courts, The Drums), recorded at Seaside Lounge, and mixed at Schenke’s Studio Windows. The album was mastered by Josh Bonati (Amen Dunes, Zola Jesus).