Cassandra Jenkins shares self-directed video for new song 'Delphinium Blue' and announces tour dates
My Light, My Destroyer Out July 12th via Dead Oceans
May 14, 2024
Photo by Pooneh Ghana
Cassandra Jenkins releases new album, My Light, My Destroyer, on July 12 via Dead Oceans. Now she's shared her second single, “Delphinium Blue,” via a self-directed music video. He has also announced some new North American tour dates. Watch the video below and the tour dates follow.
Jenkins had this to say about the song's lyrics in a press release: “Sometimes when I don't know where to turn, I look for something reliably beautiful. Applying for a job at my local florist felt like a survival instinct and this job led me to one of the bluest times of my life – being surrounded by flowers didn't just make the burden bearable – it helped me understand that and the myself better. I started dreaming in Technicolor. flowers became the language of my subconscious. Sometimes I felt as if I were surrounded by a Greek chorus while doing my menial tasks—they took on a very fine quality, as if they were holding the keys if I was willing to listen, as if they were bearers of my grief and sensitive portals of awareness.”
She had this to add about recording the song: “The lyrics to 'Delphinium Blue' have had a lonely home in the back of my mind for years and the recording process was very collaborative. The song felt like a crustacean crawling around the bottom of the ocean, trying different shells, until it finally found a home when I called Isaac [Eiger, of Strange Ranger]. We got together in his home studio and worked together to shape it before I sent it to Andrew Lappin and he agreed to sneak it onto the album as the paint was starting to dry. It felt like the right edge, so we worked in Andrew's studio in LA to bring it into the world of the album with players like Spencer Zahn on frenetic bass, Kostas Galanopoulos for some of the most impressive percussion, and Michael Coleman on synths. It's my melancholic bi-coastal bop.”
Jenkins previously shared the album's first single, “Only One,” via a music video. It was one of the songs of the week.
My Light, My Destroyer following Jenkins' famous album released in 2021, An overview of phenomenal natureand its companion album, An Overview of (An Overview of Phenomenal Nature)released later in 2021. Both released via Ba Da Bing.
In a press release announcing the new album, Jenkins says this An overview of phenomenal nature it was her “predicted swan song” that she was going to stop touring and release new music, but was then taken aback by the positive reception of this album and the attention it garnered.
“I was directing what I knew at the time – I felt lost,” says Jenkins. “When that record came out and people started responding to what I had written, my plans to quit were thwarted in the most unexpected, encouraging and generous way. Ready or not, it revived me.”
But when it came time to record a follow-up album, Jenkins initially struggled to recreate the magic in the studio, saying that after two years of touring she was “running on fumes”.
“I was coming from a place of exhaustion and exhaustion, and in the months following the session, I was struggling to accept that I didn't like the record I'd just made. I felt uninspired,” he explains, “so I started all over again.”
Leaving the initial sessions for the new album and with the help of producer, engineer and mixer Andrew Lappin (L'Rain, Slauson Malone 1), Jenkins began My Light, My Destroyer a new.
“When we were listening back in the control room that first day, I could see a space on my record shelf starting to open up because the songs were finding their homes in real time,” he says of the second attempt to record the album. “That spark informed the design for the rest of the album, and its completion was propelled by a new momentum.”
A press release mentions Tom Petty, Annie Lennox, Neil Young, David Bowie's latest album Black starDavid Berman, and albums in her “high school CD wallet” (Radiohead's The BendsThe Breeders, PJ Harvey and Pavement) as influences on My Light, My Destroyer. And the album also features a large number of collaborators including: Palehound's El Kempner, Hand Habits' Meg Duffy, Isaac Eiger (ex-Strange Ranger), Katie Von Schleicher, Zoë Brecher (Hushpuppy), Daniel McDowell (Amen Dunes), producer and instrumentalist Josh Kaufman (of Jenkins' An overview), producer Stephanie Marziano (Hayley Williams, Bartees Strange) and director/actress/journalist Hailey Benton Gates.
Coming home to New York after so much time on the road also inspired the album.
“I feel more energized when I'm out in the world, mixing things up,” Jenkins says. “Coming back home to New York, being with my close friends and my community, riding the subway and going to live shows made me want to channel that palpable sense of electricity into a room full of people – I have to to fully immerse myself in my surroundings. New York is endlessly stimulating and I'm very impressed.”
Of My Light, My DestroyerThe title of his album, Jenkins explains: “Awe is a function of nature that prevents us from losing connection. Staying in touch with awe, that light, is the best antidote to fear and the forces that try to control us with fear. So in that sense, staying in touch with awe is keeping my light intact, and this is my best tool for destroying and dismantling the parts of myself and the world around me that have the potential to cause damage. Honestly, that's what keeps me from giving up—it serves as a reminder to stop and appreciate my time on earth, for all its chaos and beauty.”
Jenkins was one of the artists featured in our 20th anniversary Covers Covers album, where he covered “It's You” by Animal Collective.
Read our 2021 interview with Jenkins, where she discusses An overview of phenomenal nature.
Cassandra Jenkins North American tour Dates:
,06/08/24 Sat – Toronto, ON – Luminato festival
07/11/24 Thu – Brooklyn, NY – Public Records (sold out)
09/19/24 Thu – Chicago, IL – Sleeping Village
09/21/24 Sa – Philadelphia, PA – Johnny Brenda's
09/22/24 Sun – Boston, MA – Sinclair
09/27/24 Fri – Montreal, QC – Pop Montreal
10/09/24 Wed – Seattle, WA – Barbosa
10/11/24 Fri – Portland, OR – The Old Church
10/13/24 Sun – San Francisco, CA – Rickshaw Stop
10/14/24 Mon – Los Angeles, CA – Zebulon
10/30/24 Wed – Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg
from our partners at http://www.undertheradarmag.com/news/cassandra_jenkins_shares_video_for_new_song_delphinium_blue_and_tour
