Acclaimed Portland-based singer-songwriter Alela Diane will return with Who’s Keeping Time? on May 22nd via Loose Music/Fluff & Gravy. It serves as the seventh instalment in one of contemporary folk’s most quietly extraordinary careers.
On the first of April last year, Michael Hurley, folk legend and indispensable presence in the Portland music scene, died at the age of eighty-three. “I was absolutely gutted,” says Alela, who didn’t just revere Hurley but knew him well. She performed in a tribute show for Hurley, and in that collective mourning, found solace and inspiration. “It was an epiphany to realize how much I missed my community. I felt very clear about what I wanted in that moment: I want to be alive. I want to see live music. I want to play it.” Plucking away in the attic of her 1892 Victorian home, she found new songs flickering in the dusty light, and a desire to play them with people.
The first preview of those songs arrived in the form of the lead single, California which you can listen to below. Of the track, she offers, “I wrote this song after a quick trip down to the tiny California town where I grew up. No matter how much time passes, part of my heart will always live among those golden hills. On this particular visit, I found myself talking to a woman who I clearly must have known in a former chapter of life, but I couldn’t place her. Time sure can move through like a wildfire. All that’s left are muted memories, elusive as ghosts.”
Though she has taken the solo route on her last handful of releases, Alela was interested in a more collective, collaborative way forward this time. She met drummer Danny Austin-Manning at Clay Street Studios one night, and he introduced her to co-producer Sam Weber (Madison Cunningham, Anna Tivel). Along with Sebastian Owens on bass, they recorded fifteen songs in less than five days, all live from the very attic where Alela wrote them. Anna Tivel contributed backing vocals and violin. Peter Lalish, of the band Lucius, added guitar. Fellow Pacific Northwesterners Kati Claborn and Luke Ydstie of Blind Pilot and AC Sapphire provided overdubs of all kinds.
The result is an 11-track set ranging from lulling to raw to cinematic, with Alela’s mellifluous voice a lively and affecting instrument throughout. The lyrics reveal an artist with the particular kind of strength required to face pain without getting lost, an ability Alela has honed over a lifetime of songwriting.
Alela will be touring Europe in May with just one date in London Rough Trade in-store, Denmark Street on Thu 28th May, but is scheduled to return in the autumn. We will let you know the moment we know. You can pre-order the album from this link.
“Who’s Keeping Time?” Tracklisting:
1) California
2) Galloping
3) In My Own Time
4) Dusty Roses
5) Could Be
6) Spring Is A Fine Time
7) Wide Open Spaces
8) Piss, Coffee, Blood Or Wine?
9) To Be Kind
10) Fragile As A Flame
11) Endless Waltz
