Grizzly Bear co-vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Daniel Rossen has spent the last year touring his solo LP You Belong There, traveling alone in his own Subaru, “with just a few acoustic guitars and a small amp” and “no crew or fancy equipment,” per press release. He’s now announced a live album compiling two of his performances supporting the album. Live At Pioneertown & Santa Fe is coming on July 28 via Warp (pre-order).
The first single is a cover of Townes Van Zandt‘s “Kathleen,” a delicate, intimate song with intricate acoustic backing. Listen to it and check out the artwork and tracklist for Live At Pioneertown & Santa Fe below. Daniel says:
The first song out is a version of “Kathleen” by Townes Van Zandt that I first performed wayyyy back in the ancient days of 2011 at my first solo show in upstate NY. It’s a bit of a departure from the original, which is the only reason I would consider releasing a cover of any Townes Van Zandt song. But this song holds a lot of memories for me.
It was a special, some might say ill-advised, tour. Solo shows, solo drives, no crew, not a lot of sleep. usually an audience. I played a show in a hotel bar in New Orleans, on a farm outside of Santa Fe, in way too many stifling churches, in lots of fun crusty clubs.
It was a glorious reality check and one hell of a way to kick off my midlife crisis. Will I ever do it again? No. But I’m glad I was able to document a couple of the shows in the form of this live album.cover art by the great Ben Tousley. The original photo for the cover was taken by Natalie Escobedo at Pappy & Harriet’s in Pioneertown.
I was pretty hellbent on calling this thing Live In the Old West and making the cover a picture of myself posed in front of an old railroad car somewhere in New Mexico, or maybe in one of those dumbass black & white photo stations where you can borrow Hollywood-style frontiersman costumery. But I restrained myself. This is serious music after all. Mostly, anyway.
The news comes days after the official release of Fleet Foxes’ live cover of Joni Mitchell’s “Hejira” that Daniel features on, and just about a month after Daniel and Grizzly Bear bandmate Christopher Bear announced their score for upcoming A24 film Past Lives.
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Daniel Rossen – Live At Pioneertown & Santa Fe Tracklist
01. Unpeopled Space
02. Silent Song
03. Shadow In The Frame
04. Golden Mile
05. Repeat The Pattern
06. Made To Rise
07. Phantom Other
08. Kathleen
09. Return To Form
10. It’s A Passage
11. Saint Nothing
12. Kentucky Waltz
