January 9, 2023

The New Pornographers - "Really Really Light"


The New Pornographers have signed to the famed indie label Merge Records and have announced a new album as well as its lead single, "Really Really Light."

 Sometimes the New Pornographers feel like a supergroup. A.C. Newman, Dan Bejar (best known to some as Destroyer), and Neko Case are all celebrated songwriters in their own right, but sometimes their best magic comes when they rejoin forces as a collective. Today, that magic continues as Newman announced that the band has signed the esteemed Merge Records and that their new album, Continue as a Guest, will be out at the end of March. Along with the news the band has also shared a new song that kicks off the record and it's called "Really Really Light." Co-written by Newman and Bejar, it's a standard track you'd expect from the Pornographers, one that has subtle twinkles of guitar, churning rhythms, and flashes of opulence that really congeals as their voices come in all together and give the song its strength. From Newman,

Part of my process throughout the years has been messing with things I never finished. I really liked Dan’s chorus, and for a while I was just trying to write something that I felt like belonged with it. I was thinking of the Aloe Blacc song “The Man” which interpolated the chorus from Elton John’s “Your Song” and thought it would be fun to interpolate a song that no one knows. Not trying to sound like Aloe Blacc, just doing some interpolating of my own. It became a game of writing a verse that felt like a part of the same song. In my mind, I was striving for a little Jeff Lynne–era Tom Petty, a classic go-to.

It's a golden tune that once again finds the band hitting their sweet spot and proving that even after two decades and counting, they're still putting out strong, flowing rock songs and can be counted upon as one of indie rock's lasting mainstays.

Continue as a Guest is out March 31 via Merge Records.

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