Half Waif Caretake

Half Waif announces new album for ANTI- & shows, shares "Ordinary Talk"

Half Waif (aka Nandi Rose Plunkett) has announced a followup to 2018’s Lavender. It’s called The Caretaker, it comes out March 27 via ANTI- Records (her first for the label), and the first single is “Ordinary Talk,” which finds Nandi embracing some serious Kid A vibes but still making them her own. Of the song, she says:

Recognizing your own ordinariness can be depressing, or it can be a relief. In ‘Ordinary Talk,’ I wanted to honor and celebrate my ordinariness as an incredible tool for making me feel less alone. The song is a reassurance that feeling bad – or ‘ill’ – isn’t something that needs to be corrected. There’s a depth of experience that comes from feeling emotions at their extremes. And it is, in fact, this vivid, varied messiness that makes us human and ordinary. The corresponding video, written in collaboration with director Kenna Hynes, tracks the progression from isolation to communion as we move from a tableau of a troupe of strange courtiers to the neon lights of a good old house party. And as the song shifts and melts away, the cast of characters follows and looks outward: up toward the vast night with its unsettling drift of stars, over a vista of coffee cups and blue TV screens and folded t-shirts – the million tiny moments that define our days.

Listen and watch the video (directed by Kenna Hynes, and written by Kenna and Nandi) below.

As mentioned, Half Waif will be opening part of the Calexico and Iron & Wine tour, including the NYC-area shows at The Capitol Theatre on February 5 (tickets) and Webster Hall on February 6 (sold out). She also plays a release show for The Caretaker at Brooklyn’s Public Records on March 27 (ticket info coming soon). All dates are listed below.

Tracklist
1. Clouds Rest
2. Siren
3. Ordinary Talk
4. My Best Self
5. In August
6. Lapsing
7. Halogen 2
8. Blinking Light
9. Brace
10. Generation
11. Window Place

Half Waif — 2020 Tour Dates
2/4 – Portland, ME @ State Theatre *
2/5 – Port Chester, NY @ The Capitol Theatre *
2/6 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall *
3/27 – Brooklyn, NY @ Public Records ^
5/5 – Boston, MA @ Cafe 939
5/6 – Northhampton, MA @ Iron Horse
5/7 – Montreal, QC @ Bar Le Ritz PDB
5/8 – Toronto, ON @ Baby G
5/9 – Detroit, MI @ Deluxx Fluxx
5/10 – Chicago, IL @ Schubas
5/12 – Washington, DC @ Songbyrd
5/13 – Philadelphia, PA @ Johnny Brenda’s
5/15 – Seattle, WA @ Sunset Tavern
5/16 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
5/18 – San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel
5/20 – Santa Ana, CA @ Constellation Room
5/21 – Los Angeles, CA @ Moroccan Lounge
6/6 – Peterborough, NH @ The Thing in the Spring

* w/ Calexico and Iron & Wine
^ The Caretaker release show