Courtney Jaye Announces 'Hymns And Hallelucinations' Album

Tropicali Records and acclaimed Kaua'i/Los Angeles-based songwriter Courtney Jaye are pleased to announce Hymns and Hallelucinations, the highly anticipated and ambitious new album with accompanying full-length album visual that Jaye calls "an introspective, meditative, psychedelic exploration into the soul of a woman: her rage, her confusion, her sadness, her sexuality, her defiance, her darkness, her strength, and her light."

Like the album, the Joshua Shoemaker-directed film is the story of a woman "discovering the deepest parts of herself as she faces her fears head-on, evolving along the way and becoming illuminated to the Ultimate Power behind it all," as Jaye states.

This is "gospel music" for the souls who want to sleep in on Sunday morning, who don't believe that anybody who doesn't look like them or think like them or dress like them or love like them is the enemy. This is music for the people who believe love matters more than judgment, and that we're all infallible, imperfect, and doing the best we can.

The full film will be released in four segments over several weeks, revealing songs from the full-length album that will be released in its entirety on Friday, May 20. Watch Part One: The Awakening from Hymns and Hallelucinations featuring the songs "The Kingdom Is Inside Of Me" and the title track on YouTube.

"This is spiritual music for weirdos ..." That's how Courtney Jaye sums up her forthcoming album, Hymns and Hallelucinations. And there couldn't be a more apt description. Don't be confused, though - this isn't a "religious" album, per se. But skimming the track listing, you could be forgiven for thinking as much ("Let There Be Light," "The Kingdom Is Inside Me," "Take It Up With The Lord"). These songs are less about religion - or at least the fundamentalist definition of religion, with its absolutes and unflinching certainties - than it is the search for God, whatever that means to you.

Jaye began her journey years earlier, when she was just a young Jewish girl who wasn't interested in religion and didn't want a Bat Mitzvah. She made a deal with her parents, promising that if they let her skip the formalities she'd find God in her life in some way. They said yes and she never looked back. She went from following the Grateful Dead to studying Native American culture in Arizona, learning to find God in every chirping bird, crashing ocean wave and epic Jerry Garcia solo. That was the God that Jaye felt connected to, not the one preached about in organized religion, which always felt so exclusionary and invidious and judgmental to her. She believes there is something higher than us and it's guided by love and the universality of every living thing.

Jaye found the courage to make Hymns and Hallelucinations from her old friend, the late "Ikey" Owens, a Grammy-winning keyboardist for The Mars Volta and Jack White. When she had doubts about making a "gospel" record, Owens encouraged her to take the risk and even offered to produce. He passed away unexpectedly shortly thereafter, and she knew she had to finish this record in his honor. Producing the album herself, Jaye is accompanied by the support of musical director William Tyler (Merge Records), Jack Lawrence (The Raconteurs), Loney John Hutchins, Luke Schneider (Third Man Records), Mikaela Davis (Rounder Records), and mixed by the genius of Tucker Martine.

Hymns and Hallelucinations is inspirational music for anybody who's had a sty year (or sty years) and they're looking for any sign of light at the end of the tunnel. While these songs don't offer all the answers, hopefully, they can make you feel connected to something inside yourself again. Because that's where you're really going to find God, isn't it?

"I poured everything into making a record about the near-death experiences - personally, artistically, and professionally - that led me to understand myself in the hopes that it can help others going through the same thing," Jaye says. "I want them to know they are not alone, that these trials life puts us through do have purpose."

Listen to the new album here:

Watch the new short film here:

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