Even if you don’t know Neal Morgan by name, you’ve probably heard his work. The drummer/vocalist/composer is a longtime collaborator of Joanna Newsom, Bill Callahan, Robin Pecknold, and others, and as Joanna herself once said, “he elevates literally every musical project he touches.” He just announced his first solo album in eight years, PAW, which arrives on March 14. It features strings from fellow Joanna Newsom collaborator Mirabai Peart, as well as guitar by Dan Elkan (Broken Bells, Hella, Team Sleep), bass by Ian “Yuck” Lindsay, and keys by Akila Fields.
As you can hear on lead single “50,” it makes a departure from his earlier percussion-based solo work, and instead finds Neal in lushly-arranged baroque pop territory. Check it out below.
Neal plays a full-band album release show at Portland’s Swan Dive on March 14, and he has more live performances planned for this year.
Tracklist
1 – Awake Again
2 – 50
3 – Feels Good
4 – Heart Ape
5 – Bald Eagle Bathing
6 – Starting Over
7 – Sit Around Dumb
8 – Bottle
9 – Calf Kicks Calf
10 – Now
11 – Goat Finds Fruit
12 – The Cave I
13 – Old Pain
14 – 50 Reprise
15 – The Cave II
16 – Plums Coming In
17 – Rabbit Dreaming
18 – Shania
19 – Spatula City
20 – Dave
21 – When You Bathe
22 – Holding It Down
23 – Goat On Roof
24 – 3PM