Margaret Glaspy shares new single ‘Memories’
Forthcoming album Echo The Diamond out August 18 via ATO
London headline show & further UK appearances confirmed for September
Margaret Glaspy shares new single ‘Memories’ today, the latest single from her recently announced album Echo The Diamond, out August 18th via ATO. The track finds Glaspy examining the emotional ruin so easily wrought by our own grieving minds. “‘Memories’ was probably the most challenging song for me to track; the take you hear is the only one I was able to get through completely,” she says. “It was a level of vulnerability I’d never gotten on record, and it holds a special place in my heart now. Even though it’s about a very specific loss for me, it seems to ricochet in different ways for anyone who hears it.”
Glaspy is on this remarkable journey with the new material. A very haunting arrangement that is destined to move so many. Painfully sincere lyrics explore this magnitude of emotions through the stunning melody on offer throughout. Margaret captures so much within the tonal choices, the structure and the explosive fragility that forges to the front of every attribute. This is one of the most moving and intimate compositions you will embrace.
Glaspy previously revealed the LP’s exultant opening track “Act Natural” which saw support from Pitchfork, Stereogum, Spin, Brooklyn Vegan, Under The Radar, and more. She has also confirmed her return to UK shores this September, touring alongside Half Moon Run before a headline show at London’s Omeara on September 20. Following this, she will tour North America in support of the album, including a hometown show at New York City’s Bowery Ballroom on October 20. All tour dates are listed below and tickets are on-sale here.
Echo The Diamond is the third full-length from Margaret Glaspy. It was produced by Glaspy with co-production from her partner, guitarist/composer Julian Lage and is the follow-up to 2020’s Devotion. Echo The Diamond takes its title from a turn of phrase that Glaspy tossed off in the midst of a conversation with Lage. “Bruce Lee once said to be water—if water is in a teacup, it becomes teacup-shaped; if it’s in a glass, then it takes the shape of that glass,” she recalls. “For me, Echo The Diamond is a way of saying ‘shine bright’, ‘be brilliant.’” The album expands on the frenetic vitality of her widely acclaimed debut Emotions and Math—a 2016 release The New Yorker hailed as an album “in which pretty songs often turn prickly, enriched by carefully measured infusions of dissonance and grit.” This time around, Glaspy worked with drummer/percussionist David King of The Bad Plus and bassist Chris Morrissey (Andrew Bird, Lucius, Ben Kweller), recording at Reservoir Studios in Manhattan and embracing an intentionally unfussy process that left plenty of room for spontaneity. “I love music with a big element of risk to it, which was really the heartbeat of this album,” she says. “A lot of what you hear are the very first takes.” Anchored in the raw yet mesmerising vocal presence and impressionistic guitar work she’s brought to the stage in touring with the likes of Spoon and Wilco, Echo The Diamond holds entirely true to the spirit of its lyrical explorations, presenting a selection of songs both unvarnished and revelatory.
Originally from the Northern California town of Red Bluff, Glaspy first started writing songs at age 15 and soon began honing the potent balance of sensitivity and incisiveness that now imbues her music. In bringing Echo The Diamond to life, she adhered to a songwriting process meant to preserve and amplify her unfettered expression (“If I sit down with a guitar for about 15 minutes, I usually have a song at the end,” she notes). Along with drawing from an eclectic mix of inspirations—Sonic Youth, Vivienne Westwood’s punk-influenced approach to fashion, Tom Waits’s music and turn as a jailbird DJ in Jim Jarmusch’s Down By Law, the 1985 Japanese Western film Tampopo—Glaspy sustained that sense of thoughtful urgency upon joining forces with King and Morrissey in the studio. “This is the most fluid and immediate music I have ever made,” she says. “I see now that I protected the creative space by surrounding myself with incredible people in making this record, and I’m so happy I did.”
As a result of Glaspy’s rigour in protecting her instincts, Echo The Diamond ultimately marks the glorious realisation of her most closely held intentions for the album. “I’m excited to make music that doesn’t try to manipulate the listener into wishing for things to be any different from what they are. Ideally, I want my songs to reveal life for what it is, and to show that it’s that way for everyone.”
Pre-order Echo The Diamond here:
https://atorecords-ffm.com/echothediamond
Margaret Glaspy tour dates
18 Aug | New York, NY | Rough Trade Records (Instore)
12 Sept | Brighton, UK | Chalk*
13 Sept | London, UK | O2 Forum Kentish Town*
14 Sept | Bristol, UK | SWX*
16 Sept | Manchester, UK | Albert Hall*
17 Sept | Glasgow, UK | SWG3*
18 Sept | Leeds, UK | Brudenell Social Club*
20 Sept | London, UK | Omeara (Headline)
28 Sept | Washington, DC | Union Stage
29 Sept | Philadelphia, PA | Underground Arts
30 Sept | Boston, MA | The Sinclair
02 Oct | Toronto, ON | Horseshoe
03 Oct | Cleveland, OH | Grog Shop
Oct 04 | Detroit, MI | El Club
Oct 06 | Minneapolis, MN | Fine Line
Oct 07 | Chicago, IL | Sleeping Village
Oct 08 | Milwaukee, WI | The Back Room @ Colectivo
Oct 10 | Nashville, TN | Blue Room @ Third Man Records
11 Oct | Atlanta, GA | Center Stage
12 Oct | Durham, NC | Motorco Music Hall
13 Oct | Asheville, NC | Grey Eagle
14 Oct | Richmond, VA | Richmond Music Hall
20 Oct | New York, NY | Bowery Ballroom
01 Nov | Austin, TX | Antone’s
02 Nov | Dallas, TX | Deep Ellum Art Co
04 Nov | Denver, CO | Ophelia’s
06 Nov | Salt Lake City, UT | Urban Lounge
07 Nov | Boise, ID | The Olympic
09 Nov | Seattle, WA | Madame Lou’s
10 Nov | Vancouver, BC | Biltmore Cabaret
11 Nov | Portland, OR | Mississippi Studios
13 Nov | San Francisco, CA | The Independent
14 Nov | Los Angeles, CA | Lodge Room
*opening for Half Moon Run
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