Folk Ambassador Peter Mulvey Releases Hypnotic New Song THE FOX

Peter Mulvey has been a singer, songwriter, road-dog, raconteur, and an almost-poet since before he can remember. With a career spanning nearly three decades, eighteen albums, and countless live performances worldwide, Mulvey has built his life's work on collaboration and on an instinct for the eclectic and the vital. On February 15th, he'll release his most vivid album yet titled There Is Another World via Righteous Babe Records. Today he unveiled the first look at the new record with the lead song "The Fox," a hypnotic pulse of altered guitar within a swirl of sounds: wineglass rims, the long breaths and clatter of a bass clarinet, and icy accordion tones underneath Mulvey's gravel baritone vocals.

Listen to "The Fox" HERE.

"Usually, Peter Mulvey is a comfort; his guitar style, his voice, his wry smile when he delivers his clever, heart-filled lyrics. ["The Fox"] sounds urgent, not comfortable," stated Folk Alley who featured the track this morning. "There is a dark underbelly that joins his narrative about walking through the woods after a winter storm and it is intriguing. What makes this song even more disquieting is the woodwinds, squeaky percussion and accordion. There is not a melody, but a meditative finger-style guitar and his voice remains low delivering almost haiku-like lyrics. It's that voice you may have heard a narrator use when you're about to hit trouble in a dark fairy tale."

Early in 2017, a series of upheavals found Mulvey living through the winter in a friend's empty house in the small midwestern town of Fort Atkinson. Unmoored and lost in the middle of his life, he spent hours each day walking along the frozen marsh of the Bark river and through the wintry oak savannah nearby. The songs came in fast and strange and vivid, which Mulvey transcribed during the night at a table in the vacant house. These songs became his new album, a powerful dreamscape of imagistic, haiku-like auditory sketches, within which are plenty of wrenching, haunting, and even sweet songs.

Produced by Todd Sickafoose (Ani DiFranco, Anais Mitchell, Andrew Bird), the thirteen track effort amounts to a remarkable, brief, potent stab. Alienation, loss, and heartbreak; all are rendered lucid, even beautiful, in the bright-dark sideways light of deep winter. It is also a story of renewal, through close attention and a determined stillness, a piercing gaze toward detail and an opening toward simple acceptance of what is.

Track Listing:

01) The Fox

02) Who's Gonna Love You Now

03) When I Was in Monaghan

04) Fool's Errand

05) False Indigo

06) Beckett Was A Bird Of Prey

07) Strayaway Child

08) To Your Joy

09) Nickel & Dime

10) Henry's Only Daughter

11) All Saints Day

12) The Cardinal

13) Owl

Tour Dates:

12/15 - Fort Atkinson, WI @ Lamplighter Sessions at Cafe Carpe (w/ SistaStrings, Shrug)

12/16 - Fort Atkinson, WI @ Lamplighter Sessions at Cafe Carpe (w/ SistaStrings, Bill Camplin)

12/20 - Fort Atkinson, WI @ Lamplighter Sessions at Cafe Carpe (w/ Nickel & Rose, John Sieger)

12/21 - Fort Atkinson, WI @ Lamplighter Sessions at Cafe Carpe (w/ Chris Porterfield, John Statz, John Stano)

12/23 - Fort Atkinson, WI @ Lamplighter Sessions at Cafe Carpe (w/ SistaStrings, Brianna Lane)

01/25-01/26 - Ann Arbor, MI @ Ann Arbor Folk Festival

02/01 - Syracuse, NY @ King of Clubs

02/13-02/16 - Montreal, QC @ Folk Alliance International

02/27 - Seattle, WA @ Ballard Homestead

02/28 - Portland, OR @ The Old Church

03/01 - San Francisco, CA @ The Lost Church

03/02 - San Francisco, CA @ The Lost Church

03/06 - Santa Ynez, CA @ Tales from the Tavern

03/08 - Santa Monica, CA @ McCabe's Guitar Shop

03/09 - Phoenix, AZ @ Roastery at Cave Creek

03/10 - San Diego, CA @ LeStat's Coffee House

03/21 - New London, NH @ Flying Goose

03/22 - New York, NY @ The Loft at City Winery

03/23 - Middleboro, MA @ Studio 84 House Concerts

03/24 - Pomfret, CT @ Vanilla Bean

03/27 - Vienna VA @ Jammin Java

03/28 - Philadelphia, PA @ The Locks at Sona

03/31 - Boston, MA @ The Sinclair

To post a comment, you must register and login.