William Fitzsimmons Shares New Album 'Incidental Contact'

Renowned singer-songwriter William Fitzsimmons has released his newest full-length album Incident Contact via Nettwerk. His first album in four years, Fitzsimmons shows a musical evolution with maximalist production styles and extremely personal lyricism.

The album title stems from the idea of chance encounters that ripple through our lives and create lasting impressions. William was inspired to start writing again after his late stepmother passed away suddenly in 2022. With this album, he hoped to accomplish two things: to honor her memory, and to make a record she would’ve enjoyed. The result is one of the most moving and honest efforts of his multi-decade career. 

William explains: “This album represents the first songs I've written in over four years. I had been greatly enjoying producing other artists, recording two albums worth of cover songs, and being a husband and father to my three children, and hadn't been overly inspired to write. In November of 2022, my stepmother died unexpectedly and left our entire family with a huge emotional hole. She had been like a mother to me and the most beautiful partner to my father for over 25 years, in addition to being an incredibly present grandmother to my children. Writing songs to me has always been a very therapeutic process. One that's helped me to manage suffering and develop understanding and clarity through difficult circumstances. I wanted to accomplish two simple things with these songs. One, to honor my stepmom's memory, and two, to make a record she herself would enjoy.”

In honor of his stepmother, William chose to incorporate 80s-inspired sounds, synthesizers, and drum machines. To outside listeners, this may feel like a departure from his signature work, but for William, it was the most fitting way to tell the story and embrace the memory of a loved one. Songs like “Over You,” “Long Distance Runner,” “Holding A Place For You,” and “Incidental Contact,” reflect on the void left by someone gone too soon. The album was produced in Nashville alongside William’s friend and producer Marshall Altman, with whom he collaborated on his fan-favorite album The Sparrow and the Crow.

Over the course of his career, William Fitzsimmons has made his living writing a specific brand of honest and inward-looking folk songs that fearlessly and candidly examine the evolving self while dexterously communicating his talent for robust melodies and catchy instrumentation. That the subject matter tends to dwell on the darker parts of human existence and relationships is no coincidence.

“I get that question all the time: ‘You ever gonna write some happy music?’” Fitzsimmons says. “There are a million different good answers—to paraphrase Ani DiFranco, ‘When I’m happy I just want to live, I don’t want to write about it’—all that’s true. Personally, my job description when it was handed to me, for whatever reason, was: ‘You need to write about the hard s.’ It became my responsibility. It might sound a little egotistical, and I don’t mean it to, but it’s just my job. That’s what I do, and I do it well. So, I write ‘sad music’; if that’s how someone wants to categorize it, that’s fine. But if you look a little deeper, I think there’s a lot more going on.”

Beginning with his debut album, Until When We Are Ghosts, he generated hundreds of million streams across fan favorite albums such as Gold In The Shadow [2011], Lions [2014], and Pittsburgh [2015]. He landed significant syncs on ABC, NBC, MTV, Lifetime, and The CW. Notably, NPR once dubbed him "A Songwriter With Vision," and he incited the applause of American Songwriter, Billboard, NYLON, Pop Matters, Rolling Stone, Q Magazine, Uncut, and more.

When it comes to his songwriting, nothing in his private life is off limits: he has written about being raised by disabled parents, experiencing two divorces, adopting his two children, and working with the mentally ill as a mental health therapist prior to his music career. His 2018 album, Mission Bell, chronicled his separation from his then-wife caused by her infidelity; when he realized that, despite their attempts to save the marriage, the split was destined to be permanent, he began work on a new album as a response to both the imminent divorce as well as his own turbulent behavioral reaction. In 2021, Fitzsimmons released Ready the Astronaut and No Promises: The Astronaut’s Return as a powerful testament to his own past, and by weaving his story through the familiar tale of Icarus, he illustrates his willingness to accept his life’s highs and lows by paying tribute to the influence they have on the future.

Coming out of the pandemic, Fitzsimmons found himself reflecting on the music of his youth and released a pair of covers albums. You can piece together his life with the songs he chose to record. On being born to blind parents he recalls: "music was this level playing field we could experience together because you don't need to be able to see to enjoy it." He delivers stirring renditions of everyone from Sufjan Stevens to R.E.M., Phoebe Bridgers to Elton John, and even shares a version of Taylor Swift’s “the 1.”

Photo Credit: Stuart Smith 

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