baxter-dury prince of tears

Baxter Dury announces new LP 'Prince of Tears,' shares "Miami" video

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Baxter Dury has just announced his fifth album, Prince of Tears, which will be his first for Heavenly and out October 27. Like on the great Happy Soup and his debut Len Parrot’s Memorial Lift, Baxter recorded it with a full band, and this time also brought in an orchestra as well. It’s still got the same shabby chic vibe you associate with Dury, including spare, snappy arrangements that pull from Studio 1 reggae and Baxter’s dad’s band… but the strings really add swoon to the proceedings. Baxter’s ability to paint a lyrical picture remains sharp. “The album is full of little fictional snapshots based on actual experiences’, Baxter says. ‘They’re biographical film soundtracks for an imaginary film about myself, which is fictional. The man singing and speaking it all is unreliable; he can’t see the world properly. Its massively delusional, but because of that it’s also emotionally true.”

Jason Williamson of Sleaford Mods appears on one track, and Rose Elinor Dougall appears on another. Madeline Hart, whose counterpoint vocals have been intrinsic to Baxter’s last two albums, is all over this one as well. You can listen to first single and the album’s opening cut, “Miami,” which is a slow-mo disco number, maybe Baxter’s take on Barry White. (Those swoony strings are in full effect here.) “He thinks he’s got swagger, he thinks he’s someone, but he’s not” Baxter says of the song’s narrator. Few can make words like “I’m the Sausage Man. The shadow licker” come to life like Baxter. Check out the video for it, as well as the cover art and tracklist, below.

With Prince of Tears getting a proper U.S. release, maybe someone can convince him to play some North American shows. Currently he’s only got dates lined up in London (Koko on Novemeber 29) and Paris (Le Trianon on December 1).

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Baxter Dury – Prince of Tears tracklist
Miami
Porcelain w/ Rose Elinor Dougall
Mungo
Listen
Almond Milk w/ Jason Williamson
Letter Bomb
OI
2017-08-01
Wanna
Prince of Tears