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| Soft People | William American band Soft People is premiering today new single "William". The song is excerpt from their upcoming album "Absolute Boys", due October 2, 2020 via Sandwich Kingdom. Soft People's music is transcendental and important; glittery and rough-spun; weaving together the varying – and often seemingly opposing – influences of its two founding members like stitches over an open wound. John Metz and Caleb Nichols met in 2009 as members of the band Grand Lake, not long after Nichols left his previous project Port O'Brien. Shortly thereafter, the two began dating; now, they've been married for six years. Though the two are both lifelong musicians, Soft People as a band was first born not out of a shared proclivity for music, but as a way to wade through rough times; though now based in their native California, the pair lived for a year in Atlanta, GA, where they moved for work not long after the 2016 election. Their first album, American Men, which was written and recorded in 2017, was largely an indictment of capitalism, the toxicity of the patriarchy, and chronicles how masculinity and capital are curious bedfellows. Now, their sophomore effort, Absolute Boys, is decidedly apolitical and distinctly queer; an enclave of universal vignettes, entreating one lover to the next within a hub of uncluttered poetry and imagination. A modern pop flicker with an edgy 80's glimmer at its beating heart, Absolute Boys is sophisticated and universal, and it feels like the natural culmination not only of a long and storied music career, but of a long and storied relationship. Absolute Boys is available for preorders at the following link : https://softpeople.bandcamp.com/album/absolute-boys ABOUT THE SINGLE In the summer of 2007 I went to the UK with the indie folk band Port O'Brien. I was the bassist, and we were on tour, doing some dates supporting Modest Mouse, and playing some festivals. "William" is a song about a boy I met at The End of the Road Festival in Dorset. I fell very in love with this guy I happened to meet, and... the rest is in the song, I suppose. It's funny to think of those times now, particularly from my vantage point in California, in 2020: in the midst of raging wildfires, the political unrest that has come to characterize American life in the Trump era, and of course in the middle of this still-rampant pandemic which has, for now, ended all touring, festivals, and, seemingly, good times. Bob Dylan famously said, "Don't look back, " but I prefer Kurt Cobain's retort, from Nirvana's Incesticide album: "Who said 'don't look back?' Don't believe 'em." In times like this, looking back feels healing; taking stock feels necessary; dreaming about where we have been might be the best way to know where we are headed. "William" is a look back: on a beautiful time now long past, that, hopefully, will come round again. — Caleb Nichols, Soft People write your comments about the article :: © 2020 Jazz News :: home page |