Big Thief - Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You

for anyone curious about the breakdown of tracks from each of the recording sessions that made up the album, here you go

Demo recorded at The Elf Inn
"Promise is a Pendulum"

Flying Cloud Studios, NY with Sam Evian
"Certainty"
"Sparrow"
"Heavy Bend"
"12,000 Lines"

Five Star Studios, Topanga Canyon, CA with Shawn Everett
"Time Escaping"
"Little Things"
"Blurred View"
"Simulation Swarm"

Studio In The Clouds, CO with Dom Monks
"Change"
"Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You"
"Flower of Blood"
"No Reason"
"Love Love Love"
"The Only Place"

Press On Studio, Tucson, AZ with Scott McMicken
"Spud Infinity"
"Red Moon"
"Dried Roses"
"Wake Me Up to Drive"
"Blue Lightning"

biggest surprise is "wake me up to drive" being from the tucson sessions, which otherwise were much more country oriented & fiddle-heavy

They recorded 45 songs in all, 20 of which are included on their staggering new double album

almost more stoked for this album's Amnesiac

yeah they've already been saying they want to release the outtakes, probably as another double album

at this point i pretty much believe they could have just released it all as a quadruple album and gotten away with it

trying to think of a precedent for that. Have One On Me wasn't as long as I remember it being

autechre?

sun-el musician put out a 2 hour 40 min "double album" in 2020

smashing pumpkins probably could have gotten close with both mcis & machina but they/their label were cowards

Press On Studio, Tucson, AZ with Scott McMicken

Was not expecting a Dr. Dog connection! (Annual appeal for folks to give “Fate” an honest listen. One of my favorite albums of the 00s.)

that breakdown of the sessions makes me wanna hear "Blurred View" ... the other three songs magical in sort of the same way

although right now my fave is "Certainty"

They just did an Insta livestream; they were working out a new song in someone’s house. It was pretty sweet

Some good running comments from viewers:

“Whatcha think of Time Skiffs?”
“This is our Get Back”
“THATS MY GRANDMA”
“buck, te amo”

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/big-thief-dragon-new-warm-mountain-i-believe-in-you/

review gets weirdly hung up on the country tracks despite eventually coming to the correct conclusion. it never at all seemed like those were a schtick, just a natural expansion of their sound. they've been playing spud infinity live for like 5 years and they've been pretty vocal about their love for john prine

it never at all seemed like those were a schtick, just a natural expansion of their sound.

Cush doesn't view it as schtick either imo, according to the review.

as i said 'despite eventually coming to the correct conclusion'

right, I didn't find it weird! I suspect he wanted to address fan expectations

looks like big thief scheduled their nyc shows on the seder nights of passover, hmm...

Love this line in that Cush review: "Twenty times, it asks “What should we do now?”, and twenty times it finds a new answer."

yeah that review is good imo!

love this record but has no one commented on adrienne lenker's pronunciation of the word "knish"?

uh oh, this might be a dealbreaker for me

if she had only consulted with a jew we could have helped her rhyme "finish" with "kiddush" or something instead

oof, I was imagining a soft K.

She's got a lot of chootzpah for that one

if she had consulted a jew, they would've picked different nyc dates!

Anyway, the potato is the point! (My uncle loved that line, fwiw)

AFAIK there is a Jew playing bass in the outfit (not sure why they chose those dates)

one Jew friend on bass, checkmate libs

I did some poking around on Max recently; turns out his dad is a well-known(?) Israeli rock & jazz musician, and his grandfather was a composer(originally from Poland)

I'm sure the shows will sell out anyway (not least with plenty of non-observant Jews buying tickets), and planning a tour is pretty challenging. Is there a northeast city they could have played those days instead that doesn't have a significant Jewish population?

i feel like the only person in the world who hasn't heard the full album yet

i wish it would just come out

I haven't heard it, and haven't listened to most of the tracks that have been released, but I am under the impression it contains a problematic pronunciation of a popular Jewish appetizer

man alive, just being tongue in cheek about the fact that i'll prob have to miss those shows lol

knish-gate

Having read the Pfork review, I totally agree w/ufo's take on this bit (re: "Spud"):

The cumulative effect is something like a full-band version of the goofy southern accent Mick Jagger puts on when he sings country songs, which seems, for him, like a way of putting genre in quotation marks, signaling his awareness of his own inauthenticity by amplifying the hokiest parts of the put-on. Though Big Thief have taken many approaches to their music over the years, this sort of winking magpie postmodernism has not been one of them, so it’s strange to hear them leaning into a schtick.

I just don't hear "schtick" or quotation marks in that song, and I agree that the review gets to the "right place" in the next paragraph... but why even go for that point in the first place?

(Other parts of the write-up are really good, though)

To put it another way - I think the "earthy" style and presentation of that song naturally (and wonderfully) follow from its subject matter.

I agree with that; I don't hear air quotes around the country & western arrangement. But I see where the reviewer is coming from because the Jew's harp boing-boing sounds inherently goofy to me. I also love it and think it suits the song very well.

It's music!

https://uproxx.com/indie/big-thief-dragon-new-warm-mountain-i-believe-in-you-review/

The New Big Thief Album Is A Masterpiece
Steven Hyden
They recorded 45 songs in all, 20 of which are included on their staggering new double album, Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You. This may strike some as hyperbole but I don’t care because it’s true: As strong as the other Big Thief albums are, they feel like rough drafts for what they’ve finally achieved here. I’ve had a promo of Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You for a few months, and it already feels like the kind of album that’s destined to be handed down from generation to generation, like Automatic For The People or Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. It’s music I know I will reach for on epic road trips or in the midst of profound grief. An all-timer. A masterpiece. They really did it this time.

― Indexed, Tuesday, February 8, 2022 12:33 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

man he does a really good job of making something dope seem lame as hell

is it out yet? only thing im seeing on streaming is 8 songs called ‘simulation swarm’

out tonight/tomorr

xp if only this was the actual album, a bait-and-switch sci-fi horror

the CD I pre-ordered via 4AD/Bandcamp apparently won't arrive until next Thursday, sadly (keep me in your thoughts during this difficult time)

I pre-ordered from Norman Records and it's been mailed and coming tomorrow.

the CD I pre-ordered via 4AD/Bandcamp apparently won't arrive until next Thursday, sadly (keep me in your thoughts during this difficult time)

― False Pretenses Lad (morrisp), Thursday, February 10, 2022 1:27 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

in the same boat :/

was hoping to avoid listening until i had the vinyl

Listening to UFOF and damn that second half is so good. Really looking forward to this new one

LP has arrived

THIS IS SO GOOD

*finished 80-minute 2xLP*

*immediately goes in for repeat listen*

5 stars. 2 thumbs up, WAY UP! 16 academy award nominations. 11 academy award wins. the hugo award winner for the 5th straight year!

that's my grandma

I listened to half the new songs last nite, but finding it a little hard to "get into" checking out the rest. It's kind of formidable, for some reason! I'll probably have to dip into it here & there.

xp
now they're america's grandma

i'm listening on bluetooth headphones as i go around my apartment doing things, cleaning, working on stuff.

god, perfect ending to the album, too. it's amazing how much these songs go in different directions but the flow is impeccable, particularly on the back half of the album.