WESTERMAN RELEASES CHOUPANA
A COLLECTION OF EARLY SKETCHES FROM HIS DEBUT ALBUM YOUR HERO IS NOT DEAD
Westerman has released Choupana, a collection of early sketches from his debut album Your Hero Is Not Dead. Choupana includes the early workings of a song that was not included on the final album, “Above Average,” and initial versions of some of the standout tracks from the project that released earlier this year via Play It Again Sam – “Blue Comanche,” “The Line,” and “Think I’ll Stay.”
The new collection of tracks feels like a separate journey to the album, it’s deep and oozes appeal found through the bleaker tones.
Westerman shares about Choupana, “Here is a selection of sketches which formed the start of the record. We spent an amount of time sculpting the music in Your Hero Is Not Dead. It’s a time intensive process of aiming for the unobtainable. Most of the time, we ended up with trying to get back to the essence of what was captured when the threads were still in the process of forming. The real vitality of the music. It’s a journey where you can only hope to end up back at the start but having learnt things and changed along the way by which point – the start appears very different – whether you like it or not. These sketches were made in Autumn; of two years ago. The cyclical nature of it all seems about right to me. There is a song in here which was not put on the record. VERY HAPPY to share these in their human fallibility and imperfection at a time when a bracing acknowledgement of said nature is much needed and often lacking from certain individuals and dogmatic clusters thereof. Thanks and love to all. W.”
Recorded alongside his close friend and producer Nathan Jenkins (A.K.A. Bullion) at first in Southern Portugal before finishing the process in London, Your Hero Is Not Dead is an album about empathy and compassion, struggle and release, and all the ways we contradict and battle within ourselves. It’s a graceful and self-reflective debut that continues the artist’s journey from pop maverick to one of the most vital British voices.
No Comments