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Black Marble shares third single “Private Show” from forthcoming album ‘Bigger Than Life’ out October 25th on Sacred Bones

October 4, 2019

Black Marble
shares vibrant video for “Private Show”
The 3rd single from the new album
Bigger Than Life out 25th October on Sacred Bones Records

Black Marble share the release of the gorgeous video for “Private Show,” the 3rd single from Bigger Than Life, the forthcoming album by Black Marble, due out October 25 on Sacred Bones Records

Shot on film and directed by Ben Joyner, the vibrantly saturated video was filmed on location in Neshoba County, Mississippi and captures Black Marble (Chris Stewart) having a singular experience amidst revelers at rodeos, horse races, concerts, amusement park rides, and carnival games while the world keeps spinning around him. As Stewart explains: “‘Private Show’ strongly reflects the themes of solitude vs. community and counterbalancing the desire for personal recognition against the feelings of safety and anonymity derived from surrendering to something bigger than oneself.  The characters of ‘Private Show’ all have a choice to make, whether to be fully themselves at the expense of their community or seek the embrace of the group at the expense of their agency.  In the end the narrator feels destined for the path of solitude yet makes an effort to find another kindred spirit for the journey.”

“Private Show” is the only song on Bigger Than Life that involves musicians other than Chris Stewart, as it features additional guitar from Emily Edrosa.

“Private Show” is also notable for being the first Black Marble video that Chris Stewart has ever appeared in. As he puts it: “I’ve preferred in the past not to be featured in my music videos but having set the stage in this way it felt right to metaphorically ‘show up’ for this one and lend myself to this character who feels both on the inside and outside of this world at the same time.  Both I and the director grew up in the south and likely felt some of the themes from the song personally, so it was easy for me to be this person who moves through this seductive and tight knit world like a ghost.”
 

Director Ben Joyner has this to say: “For ‘Private Show,’ I really wanted to create something that felt alive and spontaneous. The track had this immense emotional weight to it, but also felt really fun. The goal was to craft something that reflected that feeling.” He adds, “The concept was born out of my personal relationship with an event in Mississippi called the Neshoba County Fair. It’s the nation’s largest campground fair, an abandoned southern shantytown that comes to life for one week every year at the end of July. It’s a wild and beautiful place that feels almost frozen in time. And while it’s really unique and special, it also carries some historical tension that is palpable. The music provided a rich emotional landscape to explore the place and the people that inhabit it. I loved the idea of bringing Black Marble to the fair and sort of dropping him into the middle of the spectacle.”

As with every Black Marble album, Stewart recorded, produced, and played everything you hear on Bigger Than Life using entirely analog gear, though the process was new. This time around, he wrote everything on his MPC and sequenced it live to his synths — only using the computer to record, not to create.

He also approached his vocals in a new way this time, bringing them forward in the mix and retreating from the reverb-drenched affect he has utilized in the past. The result is the finest vocal performance of his career, still processed and distant-sounding, but more immediate than ever before. The beguiling vocal hooks, always present in Black Marble’s music but formerly obscured by the production, are now the focal point of songs like “One Eye Open” and “Feels.”

“Private Show” follows the previously released singles “One Eye Open” and “Feels” which have been receiving praise:

“Positivity, and perhaps the California climate, comes through in bouncy, catchy first single ‘One Eye Open’ that has Stewart’s vocals a little more forward in the mix than we’ve heard before.” – Brooklyn Vegan 

“‘Feels’ is warmly nostalgic for ’90s college radio (and ’80s synthpop)” – Brooklyn Vegan

“There’s no better way to immediately conjure up feelings of nostalgia than with a bouncy ’80s-inspired synth, and Black Marble’s Chris Stewart knows that. His latest single “Feels” is all about saying goodbye to the comfort of the past, no matter how difficult that might be.” – MTV.com

“‘One Eye Open’ is a foot-tapping, head-nodding groove. Synths staccato and soar in equal measure, with Stewart’s vocals being the only non-electronic sound on the track. While Stewart’s timbre is firm and secure, his lyrics are anxiously awaiting a potential failure.” – Paste

“For his latest release, the Los Angeles transplant has signed to Sacred Bones Records, joining a cast of musicians that includes David Lynch, John Carpenter, and Jim Jarmusch. While his sparse lo-fi pop might sound great behind any of their filmmaking, his music has also drawn comparisons to the work of John Maus, Cold Cave, and other recent champions of 1980s synth pop. On new single “One Eye Open,” he channels the pulsing rhythms of Oppenheimer Analysis, Unovidual, and others on the UK imprint Minimal Wave with the slick precision of years spent tinkering with analog gear.” – SPIN

“‘Feels’ channels the pulsing rhythms of acts like Tears For Fears and The Cure with the stiff arpeggios and digital synth strings that evoke the much beloved synth-pop genre known as minimal synth music. While the short-lived late-80s genre has seen something of a resurgence in recent years thanks to the popularity of acts like John Maus and Cold Cave, no one does it better than Black Marble, who filters his affinity for retro electronics through a wide-eyed fascination with the world around him.” – SPIN

“{“One Eye Open”} feels like what might happen if the 1975 and New Order formed a supergroup. It’s expectedly synthy, but the top-line melody has a certain unsettled anxiety about it, mostly due to its ’80s techno-tweak vibe.” – Stereogum

“‘Feels’ is a dark, smeared-lens take on the aesthetic pioneered by New Order, Soft Cell, and such. This time the mirage effect is explicitly mirrored in the lyrics, which piece together images of some imagined character’s life in the 1990s. Stewart intends the resulting portrait to contrast with the present in ways that do not flatter our modern existence.” – Stereogum

Pre-order Bigger Than Life HERE

Black Marble – Bigger Than Life
October 25, 2019 – Sacred Bones Records
 

1. Never Tell
2. One Eye Open
3. Daily Driver
4. Feels
5. The Usual
6. Grey Eyeliner
7. Bigger Than Life
8. Private Show
9. Shoulder
10. Hit Show
11. Call


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