Laura Veirs has announced details of her new album, Found Light, out 8th July via Bella Union.
For Veirs fans everywhere the announcement of new material is always welcomed greedily, breathed in, deeply. For everyone – familiar and unfamiliar with her this work is something new and exciting.
Laura Veirs’ twelth studio album is something renewed as it is her very first record with co-production credits (alongside Shahzad Ismaily), and finds Veirs embracing a self-sovereignty and artistic independence she’d never known previously. Portland OR-based Veirs’ music output has been her autobiography in many ways and we have been invited to understand her life’s experiences alongside her and marvel at her strong, certain-timbre voice and beautiful instrumentation.
2020’s My Echo was written and mixed prior to her divorce from her longtime husband and creative partner. The separation left her questioning her identity as an artist. Would she ever make music again? Historically, Veirs handled her song’s most fundamental elements — the writing and the singing — but she always left arrangement and production decisions to her partner, even down to the final tracklist. Found Light is therefore triumphant if also tentative as it both proves to Veirs that she can do it alone, but also that she needed to remember how. Following a string of brief sessions (some with Death Cab for Cutie multi-instrumentalist Dave Depper, and some alone in her own home), she booked time at Portland’s Jackpot Studios, then called her old friend Ismaily and asked him to join. They clicked and opted to co-produce the album. Ismaily offered guidance and insight, but gave her space to make her own choices and invite her own guests, like Sam Amidon and Karl Blau. She finally sang while she played guitar, realizing perhaps for the first time she was actually great at something she’d done most of her life.
Found Light is a provocative document of it all, from her paintings that adorn it to her tales of lovers and woes and realizations therein. Despite the sadness and suffering that prompted these 14 graceful wonders, they are ultimately a testament to the inspiration of independence, to shaping new possibilities for yourself even after great loss. Found Light is a reminder that we are always capable of something more.
“Winter Windows”, replete with energetic, fuzzed-out guitars and driving percussion, is a showcase of this feminist liberation, and its playful video sees Veirs dancing to the beat of her own drum in her basement—a perfect mirroring of the cathartic experience found within the album. “I love how this video captures feelings of freedom and strength and weirdness, despite the lyrics in this song being quite heavy in places,” explains Veirs. “I hope this video conveys the confidence and sense of aliveness that I feel now as a solo woman in the world after a tough two and a half years of going through my divorce and the pandemic.”
The song, she says, is “very much about the strength of mothers and the power that women in cooperation have to shape their own lives and the lives of children. It’s about us taking the reins of life and sharing our internal light and power. I believe these rays of strength echo outward and foster love that is passed through the generations. It was fun to stretch my vocals on the high chorus near the end. This song gets at my punk roots but feels confident and current to my life right now.”
(photo credit: Shelby Brakken)
Laura Veirs June UK tour:
Thursday 9th June – Norwich – Norwich Arts Centre
Friday 10th June – Nottingham – The Bodega Social Club
Saturday 11th June – Cambridge – Storey’s Field Centre
Sunday 12th June – Birmingham – Hare & Hounds
Tuesday 14th June – Gosforth – Civic Theatre
Wednesday 15th June – Edinburgh – Summerhall Arts Venue
Thursday 16th June – Glasgow – Stereo
Saturday 18th June – Leeds – Belgrave Music Hall
Sunday 19th June – Manchester – The Deaf Institute
Tuesday 21st June – Pentrych – Acapela Studios
Wednesday 22nd June – Bristol – Thekla
Thursday 23rd June – Exeter – Phoenix
Saturday 25th June – Glastonbury – Glastonbury Festival
Monday 27th June – Portsmouth – Wedgewood Rooms
Tuesday 28th June – Guildford – The Boileroom
Wednesday 29th June – Brighton – Komedia
Thursday 30th June – London – Union Chapel
Found Light tracklist:
- Autumn Song
- Ring Song
- Seaside Haiku
- Naked Hymn
- My Lantern
- Signal
- Can’t Help But Sing
- Eucalyptus
- New Arms
- Sword Song
- Time Will Show You
- T & O
- Komorebi
- Winter Windows
