Fanatic is a music marketing company established by Josh Bloom in 1997 to build fan-to-fan connections between artists and the media. For nearly 30 years, Fanatic has continued to help launch careers through the strategic advocacy of creative talent.
Leader Hilarie Sidney brings her history as co-founder
of Elephant 6 Recording Co. + The Apples In Stereo to current band’s pop-psych
mix. +++
The High Water Marks (L-R): Logan
Miller, Hilarie Sidney, Per Ole Bratset, Øystein Megård. Photo credit: Self-Portraits, Illustration by Per Ole
Bratset. +++
[STREAM]: https://Fanatic.lnk.to/TheHighWaterMarks-Proclaimer-Single +++ The press calls The
High Water Marks “pulse-raising mega-pop,” (UNCUT), with “sugar-coated melodies to spare” (Pitchfork), that offers “garage pop for the masses” (Paste), and now Under
The Radar rings in with the premiere
of the title track of the band’s upcoming new album, calling “Proclaimer of Things,” “an
irresistible power pop gem.” The upcoming Proclaimer of Things album is the
second full-length in just over a year from The High Water Marks, following a (too long!) 13-year hiatus. The Grøa, Norway and Lexington, Kentucky-based band
fronted by Hilarie Sidney, the
co-founder of the Elephant 6 Recording
Co. and one of its core bands The
Apples In Stereo, maintains and extends the high-energy fantastic fuzz of
those sounds. The “Proclaimer
of Things” single, featuring lead vocal by Sidney’s bandmate and husband, Per
Ole Bratset (along with a boyhood photo of Sidney’s great grandfather on the cover!) is out now
and today, MXDWN has premiered
the video for the song, saying it “is catchy and upbeat and has the
potential to be on your favorite playlist on repeat.” The full 13-song Proclaimer of Things album arrives Feb. 4th, 2022 via Minty Fresh. Bratset says, “The title comes from an inside joke Hil and I always play around with. If
we catch ourselves being a little preachy or pompous, we add ‘I am the
proclaimer of things!’ at the end. We picture this guy with a crazy mustache
and top hat going around ‘proclaiming things,’ while holding up a scroll and
wearing a monocle. It always makes it weird and hilarious!” Sidney elaborates on the appearance of her great grandfather
on the cover of the single, saying, “His dad owned a roller rink in the 1880s
in Iowa. My great-grandpa was so good at skating and doing tricks on both the
bike and the skates that he started performing around the Midwest, and as far
west as Colorado. He earned an insanely good chunk of cash for doing this, thus
supporting the family. He went under the moniker, Little Willy Sidney, and Wee
Willy Sidney, hahaha.” +++
Hilarie Sidney from The High Water Markschats
about the band’s upcoming album as well as her Elephant 6 and Apples In
Stereo history in Denver with the city’s own Westword. Check
it out and feel a mile high! +++ The High
Water Marks | About
“I am so lucky to have been a musician throughout my
life,” says Hilarie Sidney,
currently fronting The High Water Marks,
and best known as co-founder of the revered musical collective Elephant Six, and one of its three core
bands The Apples In Stereo. Based in her adopted home town of Grøa, Norway, Sidney and The High Water Marks are prepping to release Proclaimer of Things, the
band’s second album in just over a year, following-up the 2020 album Ecstasy
Rhymes, its first album in 13 years. Coming back after such a long stretch of being off the
scene with a critically and commercially welcomed new album, and then quickly
coming in hot with another batch of 13 songs, isn’t an accident. In this case,
it’s a coping mechanism. With the United States reaching a milestone of 1 in
500 people having succumbed to COVID-19, it’s tragic news that this statistic
hits home for Sidney. Her mother,
half a world away, passed from the virus earlier this year. “Not being able to see her and knowing that she was
alone, dying in a nursing home, still haunts me daily,” Sidney courageously reveals. Sidney knew that when she began to build a life in Norway
with her band mate and husband Per Ole
Bratset and their son, that she would be just a 12-hour flight from the
rest of her family, but that 12 hours became something completely different
under lockdown. “I never factored in a pandemic,” she says. “At least
my mom got to hear our record before she passed away. That means a lot to me
because she was always really supportive of my music.” The thirteen songs that comprise Proclaimer of Things are
just a drop in the bucket, considering how much Sidney has leaned on songwriting to take her mind off things. “I feel like I can’t pick up the guitar without
writing a little melody. As therapy, we decided to keep recording. We dove into
the project to keep us sane, focused, and from going down the rabbit hole of
depression and self-pity.” Through it all, The
High Water Marks made an album that is positive, light, happy, and
meaningful. “I think my mom would approve of my method of dealing
with the grief of losing her.” Sidney
says with trademark optimism. Proclaimer of Things, the latest album by The High Water Marks, is scheduled for release on Feb. 4th, 2022 on Minty Fresh. +++ The High Water Marks | Links ASSETS : FACEBOOK : INSTAGRAM : SPOTIFY : APPLE : MINTY FRESH +++ Josh Bloom at Fanatic
Promotion | Contact WEBSITE
: FACEBOOK : TWITTER : YOUTUBE : INSTAGRAM : SOUNDCLOUD : SPOTIFY : BLOG : E-MAIL
Record release show also this Friday at Austin’s Hole
In The Wall; Live dates in Nashville, Knoxville, more announced. Hear “Georgica” now. +++
Jenny
Parrott as photographed
by Carrie Jane Fink. Design by Catfish.
+++ PLAY, POST & SHARE Jenny Parrott | “Georgica”
[STREAM]: https://Fanatic.lnk.to/JennyParrott-Georgica +++ “Feathery and bouncy… ‘Georgica’ sounds
like floating.” – The Austin Chronicle “There is nothing to not like about Jenny
Parrott.” – Folk Radio UK “American icon Kinky
Friedman has been quoted as saying Jenny
Parrott’s tunes are ‘the best songs I’ve heard since Christ was a cowboy!’ That
statement isn’t going to wear out too soon. There is nothing to not like about Jenny Parrott, be sure to get more of
her in your life. ‘Georgica’ is also
our Song of the Day.” Check
outFolk Radio UK’s premiere
coverage of “Georgica” by Jenny Parrotthere
or listen at the links above. In its “What We’re
Listening To Right Now”coverage
of the song, The Austin Chronicle
adds, “Song bells and poco forte flute solos trickle through lyrical breaks,
solidifying the overall angelic airiness of the ballad, a reminder of Parrott's
easygoing verse and strong musical talent.” “‘Georgica’
is the name of my hometown friend's little girl,” Parrott says. “Her mother – the Grandma – asked me to write a song
as a gift to her. We aren’t especially in touch anymore – I live very far away
– but the song has a vibe of sending warm, maternal, motherly well-wishes
through time and space from an older source to a younger one. It’s almost like
a prayer and call for hope for young female energy. When I think about this
song, I almost feel like I'm up in space, singing to the planet.” +++ Jenny Parrott The
Fire I Saw (Parking Lot Panic Attack) Nov 12th, 2021
Track Listing: 01. Knockin’ Back Some Cokes (STREAM) 02. My Hero 03. I Thought (STREAM) 04. Say It 05. Georgica (STREAM) 06. Hallelujah 07. July 08. The Fire I Saw (Is There Anyone To Meet Me?) +++ Jenny Parrott | Live
11/12/2021: Austin, TX @ Hole In The Wall (Record Release Show, RSVP) 11/16/2021: Nashville, TN @ Nashville Vinyl Tap 11/17/2021: Knoxville, TN @ Albright Grove Brewing 11/27/2021: Eureka Springs, AR @ Gotahold Brewing 12/31/2021: High Springs, FL @ Riverine Reunion (Oleno State Park 1894 SE Oleno Park Rd,
7PM) +++ Jenny Parrott | About
Jenny
Parrott’s 2017 solo debut When
I Come Down was named one of the Austin
Chronicle’s Top
10 albums of that year. Her follow-up full-length The Fire I Saw arrives on
Nov. 12th, 2021. The new album is, naturally, an evolution of Parrott’s seemingly effortless
lyricism, humor mixed with despair, and ultimately, her economic use of
unforgettable melodies and just-right instrumentation that makes you feel like
she’s seeing you even more than she’s seeing herself. “These arms can’t stand an ever loving man. And these
eyes can’t see a never changing me.” The opening lines of first single “I Thought” stop you dead in your tracks. A perfect example of what
Parrott does over the course of an
album that doesn’t even clock in past 25 minutes and doesn’t need to. Parrott takes care of all business
during the brief span of the eight songs on The Fire I Saw, in a way
many songwriters work an entire career towards and never reach. The album was originally going to be a more
standard-length release, but the pandemic changed up Parrott’s plans. “I had to give the album a makeover because I was
planning on having all my buds come over and finish it in the home studio. Most
of my friends in Austin are rootsy-type players, so it would have had that
feel. But I was stuck at home in a damp cul-de-sac, and I was scared of the
virus, and didn’t want anyone in my space,” she explains. Teaching herself Logic, and putting her Roland Juno
into overdrive, Parrott spent time
testing and tweaking her favorite synth patches until she had whittled the
album down to the “eight that I felt were okay.” Some may say, the eight are more than “okay.” American icon, Kinky
Friedman has been quoted as saying Parrott’s
tunes are “the best songs I’ve heard since Christ was a cowboy!,” which, it can
be argued, is a more interesting string of words than anything Kinky could have actually been talking
about, but we get the idea! Parrott has played prisons, a Black Panther reunion party,
children’s shows, on streets all over the world, and in every basement from
here to New York. She has opened for Jonathan
Richman, Pokey LaFarge, and Delbert McClinton. These aren’t mere
credits, they are experiences that you should rightfully expect inform Parrott’s songs. And not all of the experiences need to be so flashy.
Mundane works just fine, too. Parrott describes the album track “July” as being “written while taking out the garbage in Macon,
Georgia” and opener “Knockin’ Back Some
Cokes” as “a play on how Sam Cooke
is always singing about Coke and popcorn and cake and ice cream,” although she
goes on to rightly remark that her take contains “sinister lyrics about facing
down climate change and the apocalypse.” Similarly stark is the previously mentioned, “I Thought,” which, while taking Parrott’s stock of her ability to love
and be loved, was “written as a response to an abusive relationship at a time
in my life where I swore I’d cut out people with violence in their repertoire.” “A lot of the songs are about life, death, and faith,”
she says. “Like, having enough faith to wonder about your child’s future in ‘Georgica,’” she explains, referring to
another of the album’s upcoming singles, which was written for a hometown
friend that Parrott used to sing
with. “I am trying to be myself with the songs and
performances, instead of putting out a record with the right number of
happy-sounding songs on it,” she says. “You don’t have to use a dude’s guitar
part to spare his feelings! That will only dim the fire within you that you
saw, and you’ve got to feed it.” The Fire I Saw, the second solo album by Jenny
Parrott, arrives on Nov. 12th,
2021, preceded by the singles “I
Thought” and “Georgica”. Jenny Parrott is
available for interviews. Contact Josh Bloom
at Fanatic for more information. +++ Jenny
Parrott | Links ASSETS : WEBSITE : FACEBOOK : TWITTER : INSTAGRAM : YOUTUBE : BANDCAMP : SPOTIFY : APPLE +++ Josh Bloom at Fanatic
Promotion | Contact WEBSITE
: FACEBOOK : TWITTER : INSTAGRAM : YOUTUBE : SOUNDCLOUD : SPOTIFY : BLOG : E-MAIL
New tune nods to legends Lucinda Williams, Dolly
Parton, Tanya Tucker; Track is latest single from Draper’s “Patience and
Lipstick,” out Jan. 21st. +++
Linda
Draper as photographed by
Jeff Um +++ PLAY, POST & SHARE Linda Draper | “’81 Camaro”
+++ Linda Draper’s new single “‘81
Camaro,” out today, is an authentic country number from the Antifolk pioneer, but the sentiments
are straight from Draper’s
iconoclastic downtown NYC roots. The tune is the latest single from Draper’s upcoming Patience and Lipstick (Jan. 21st, South Forty Records). “You said money can’t buy happiness, Well then give
away your money, Now tell me how it feels to be free, Are you happy now?,” she sings on the tune. Draper explains, “It’s a song about longing for the days of innocence, all
the while knowing that those days are behind me, but still living for the joy
that each moment has to offer, even if I have nothing but gratitude and the
holes in my pockets to give in return. “It is really the current state of life I find myself
in now as I gear up for a move from New York, where I have lived my whole life,
to the North Carolina coastline.” +++ Linda Draper | In The Press
“Draper’s
illuminating sound provides a radiant glow.” — No Depression “Captivating magic.” — All Music Guide “Not unlike folk mama Joan Baez.” — Time Out New
York “Channeling the finger-plucked folk music of Joni Mitchell and Nick Drake.” — American
Songwriter “Full of atmosphere with elegant,
every-note-in-the-right-place instrumentation.” — Popmatters +++ Linda Draper | Live
11/06/2021: Brooklyn, NY @ Pete’s Candy
Store (709 Lorimer St., w/ Atoosa Grey) +++ Linda Draper | About
“I asked them what the secret to a long and happy
marriage was,” Linda Draper says,
recalling a post-gig conversation with a pair of married fans. “Jack is very patient,” Ivana, a flight attendant who
works long hours, explained. “And Linda,” she continued, “I always carry a tube
of lipstick in my purse. No matter how late it is, as soon as I turn the corner
towards home, I reapply!” Patience and Lipstick (Jan. 21st,
2022, South Forty Records) is
now the fortuitous title of Draper’s
upcoming new album, and the tunes on the currently Brooklyn, soon to be North
Carolina-based artist’s latest feel like they came about just as naturally. “So the secret to a long and happy marriage is
patience and lipstick?!,” Draper
thought. “You know, I think there’s a song in there somewhere.” Patience and lipstick. The phrase also encompasses another idea: Of being
willing to wait for things to get better and being ready to shine when they do.
For Draper, the road to this record
has been long, and not just because she has paid so many dues on the NYC
songwriter scene, starting with her debut album Ricochet twenty years
ago. While Patience and Lipstick leans more
country than any previous Draper
album, anyone who may try to push her into the gentile, soon-to-be-North
Carolinian corner, needs to know that the vulnerability in Draper’s songs is matched with the strength and attitude of a New
Yorker. Draper faced down and blew away many an audience at the
Lower East Side’s songwriter testing ground Sidewalk Cafe (RIP) in the early years, and her first four albums
were produced by noted iconoclast, Kramer
(currently seeing his own resurgence with the re-boot of his groundbreaking
record label Shimmy Disc.) Talk is cheap still they keep speaking in their
crooked tongues Trying to sell me the idea we’re all in this together I beg to differ... I beg to differ We were never all in this together There is no tether nor was there ever The lyrics are from “Tether,” the first single from Patience and Lipstick, a
perfect example of Draper’s special
way of twisting a dark tune, tinged with the appropriate cynicism, into a
sing-along. Draper wrote the song just as the pandemic was shutting down
the city. “I was amazed and disgusted with how, literally
overnight, every TV commercial, news outlet, and talk show was suddenly
barraging us with these insincere and overly sentimental messages about how we
are all in this together,” she says. “If there is anything that maybe everyone
can all agree on these days, it is that we are not all in this
together.” It is a message of passion, blunt truth, and Draper’s personal reality, and it calls
for patience. And it’s the album’s follow-up single “‘81 Camaro” that has gotta be the lipstick. “My dream is for the folks at Cowboys (described
online as “Orlando’s Best Country Nightclub”) to make up a country line dance
for this song that I can actually learn how to dance to with them,” Draper exclaims. The tune truly has the potential to become a standard
in that way, which makes Draper’s
other dream of having Lucinda Williams
cover it, seem plausible. Patience and lipstick. Draper also identified with this in her decision to cover
the 1972 Barbara Keith song “Detroit or Buffalo,” another of the
album’s many highlights. “As soon as JeffEyrich (Draper’s current producer, and himself a country music authority,
having toured as bassist with all-time great, Tanya Tucker) shared this song with me, I instantly knew I wanted
to cover it,” Draper remembers. “Barbara’s voice, and the message in her
lyrics, are timeless, raw, and fearlessly vulnerable.” On the fearless tip, Draper is also embarking on another new journey (a metaphorical
one, not her upcoming relocation.) “The name is inspired by the area in Montana next to
where my mother’s side of the family has had their ranch since the 1930s,” she
explains of South Forty Records, her
newly formed label. “With the label, I’ve decided to provide a musical
homestead, by honoring the music for the generations that came before and
preserving it for the generations that will follow.” It’s an endeavor inspired by her family’s near-century
long relationship to the land, delivered with an acknowledgement that the
effort may only bear its greatest fruit in the distant future. However, when it
does, there is little doubt that Draper’s
talents will impress. Patience and lipstick. Patience and Lipstick, the latest album by Linda Draper, is scheduled for release on Jan. 21st, 2022 preceded by the singles “Tether” (Oct. 8th), “‘81
Camaro” (Nov. 5th),
and “All In Due Time” (Jan. 7th). +++ PLAY, POST & SHARE Linda Draper | “Tether”
[STREAM]: https://Fanatic.lnk.to/LindaDraper-Tether +++ “At its core, ‘Tether’ is a protest
song. It is a message of passion, blunt truth, and Draper’s personal reality,
and it calls for patience.” – The Big Takeover Head over
to The Big Takeover to check out
the premiere of “Tether,” the first
single from Linda Draper’s upcoming Patience
and Lipstick (Jan. 21st,
South Forty Records). “I wrote this song during lockdown at the beginning of
the pandemic,” Draper says. “I was
amazed and disgusted with how, literally overnight, every TV commercial, news
outlet, and talk show was suddenly barraging us with these insincere and overly
sentimental messages about how we are all in this together. “If there is anything that maybe everyone can all
agree on these days, it is that we are NOT all in this together. We have never
been more divided and distrustful. Those cozy little bubbles that we got
ourselves stuck in just keep on popping. Now it’s time to face the music.” +++ More about
Linda Draper
Linda Draper grew up in a musical home as the daughter of a
classical guitar virtuoso who studied with Andres
Segovia. She began playing guitar and writing songs as a child and
eventually became a fixture in the downtown New York City's Antifolk music
scene on the Lower East Side. Since 2001, Draper
has released numerous albums, toured the US and UK, and opened for acclaimed
musicians such as Teddy Thompson, Melissa Ferrick, Luka Bloom, and Eilen Jewell.
Draper has also seen her songs
licensed for commercials and television. She is now embarking on her biggest challenge to date
with the formation of her own label, South
Forty Records. Patience and Lipstick,” Draper’s
upcoming new album, was produced by Jeff
Eyrich, mixed by Grammy®-award winning engineer, Dae Bennett, and features performers David Mansfield (Strings), Jeff Eyrich (Bass), and Doug Yowell (Drums and Percussion). It
is the inaugural release on the artist’s own label South Forty Records. Linda Draper is
available for interviews. Contact Josh Bloom
at Fanatic for more information. +++ Linda
Draper | Links ASSETS : WEBSITE : FACEBOOK : INSTAGRAM : YOUTUBE : SPOTIFY : APPLE
: SOUTH FORTY RECORDS +++ Josh Bloom at Fanatic
Promotion | Contact WEBSITE
: FACEBOOK : TWITTER : INSTAGRAM : YOUTUBE : SOUNDCLOUD : SPOTIFY : BLOG : E-MAIL
