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JESCA HOOP ANNOUNCES TWO NEW SINGLES & US tour dates with ELBOW

November 14, 2019

JESCA HOOP

ANNOUNCES TWO NEW SINGLES
&
US tour dates with ELBOW 

New tracks Bygone Era and Waking Andreas online now

BYGONE ERA – ON STREAMING SERVICES 

Jesca Hoop’s new AA single Song for a Bygone Era / Waking Andreas (grouped together under the name Stonechild Afterbirth) serve as a postscript to her much heralded fifth album STONECHILD released earlier this year via Memphis Industries. Jesca describes the songs as follows:

“As I grow and travel on through life so do the those that I hold dear. It is not easy to let go of people places and things as life inevitably moves us on.. especially if safety and sacred was found. Song For A Bygone Era is dedicated to my dear old friends and teachers ,Tony Berg, Blake Mills and Shawn Everett with whom I made my first four records xx

Waking Andreas refers to the fault line that runs through California. If you have ever loved you have likely been troubled by love. Perhaps shaken to your core. I’m a California girl. I love deeply. The trouble for me comes in no small tremor.”

Jesca has been touring throughout 2019 including a magnificent performance at the Barbican in October and festival highlight slot at Green Man in August.  Jesca continues her US tour through to the end of November and has just been confirmed as special guest on Elbow’s upcoming 2020 US and UK tour.

Produced by John Parish (PJ Harvey, Aldous Harding, This Is The Kit), recent album STONECHILD (and these two new songs) was recorded in Hoop’s long time home Manchester – a first, given previously she’s ventured back to her native California to record.  Parish’s minimal and purist approach helped clarify Hoop in her ideas subtly yet effectively realigning her sound. The simplified arrangements draw focus to the fundamental sophistication of the songs.

The album title was settled after a trip to a Philadelphia’s Mütter Museum, where the Stonechild is a sad, compelling display of an unborn foetus carried by a woman for over 30 years. “They become a hard ball of bones, a rock. Phonetically, it’s a beautiful sounding word – hard and soft – but also, I am taken by the idea of carrying something for a long time, perhaps in secret and then giving it up. I hope I have made an album of substance. There is meat on the bone”

While Hoop’s trademark finger-plucked guitar and ethereal textures remain, the songs and their presentation are ever more direct. “He – Parish – was a gentle collaborator until he killed one of my darlings” Hoop jests. “I’ve never been so brutally edited, and I wasn’t shy about expressing my discomfort at the sight of my work on the cutting room floor. He said, you will forgive me, and in some way I think I actually enjoyed that treatment…being stripped back to the bare basics…albeit painfully.  ‘STONECHILD’ ventures further into fresh territory with other voices joining the narrative, with Kate Stables (aka This is the Kit) Rozi Plain and Lucius singing the choruses and expanding the sensual depth of the sonic bloom.

These rich and curious songs derived from themes of our troubled times speak Hoop’s heart and mind from her empathetic yet tough loving centre point. With writing so fluid, so natural the result is an album where everything is truly meant.

Upcoming tour dates:

13 Nov – Los Angeles, CA, Highland Parl Ebell
15 Nov – Minneapolis, MI – The Cedar Cultural Center
16 Nov – Chicago, IL- Beat Kitchen
19 Nov – Vienna, VA, Jammin Java
20 Nov – Philadelphia, PA, Boot & Saddle
21 Nov – New York, NY, Mercury Lounge
23 Nov – Boston, MA, City Winery

16 Jan – Mexico City, Auditorio Nacional
18 Jan – San Diego, CA, House of Blues with Elbow 
19 Jan – Los Angeles, CA, The Wiltern with Elbow
20 Jan – Oakland, CA, Fox Theater with Elbow
21 Jan – Santa Ana, CA, The Observatory Santa Ana with Elbow 

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