On "Didn't I", the new song from Boy Scouts aka Oakland-based singer/songwriter Taylor Vick, there is no question too big and no detail too small to be glossed over on the way to an answer. "When did the time go by / Talking lucid dreams / Wondering if we've ever / Known what it all means," she ponders as pedal steel, Hammond organ and cello lightly twinkle around the song's steady guitar line.
Directed by Lucy Sandler (Billie Eilish, Rosie Tucker), the song's new video shows Taylor in intimate and contemplative moments at different locations in the Bay Area, including the Pelican Inn, Bolinas Ridge, the Alpine Dam and more. Watch it below.
"Why are we alive? Is there a point to any of this? Have I done this before? I was thinking about these questions like that, just playing with these ideas and being curious, " she says of the song. "I lost that curiosity for many years, and it came back to me in the last year. I started to wonder about these types of things again. It feels better to have curiosity for life."
"Didn't I" is the second pre-release track on the upcoming album Wayfinder, to be released on October 1. The album's first single "That's Life Honey" was called "Gorgeously bittersweet" and "immediately compelling" by Stereogum. Wayfinder feels bold and assured, buoyed by the strands of slide guitar, organ, and strings ring under Vick's affable, expressive voice that bolsters layers and layers of harmony.
Vick found the title to Wayfinder in Sallie Tisdale's book Advice for Future Corpses (and Those Who Love Them): A Practical Perspective on Death and Dying. The word prompted her reflection on the ways that music has, throughout her life, illuminated the path ahead. "For my whole life, music has been a crucial part of my identity and how I relate to the world," Vick says. "The act of making music has been my wayfinder during the past year."
"I am endlessly fascinated by questions about life, why we're here, about reincarnation, eternity, etc. and am equally as fascinated at the fact that no one knows the answers!" Vick exclaimed. "As hard as it is, being alive at all seems like a miracle. And when I remember that and try to view life through that lens, being alive feels like a gift and a treasured opportunity."
