photo credit: Daniel Roland Tierney
Stream: “Clear Notes For A New National Anthem” on Bandcamp or All Streaming Platforms
Human Potential, the musical project of Andrew Becker, is set to release their anticipated new album, I Write Wedding Songs, on November 15, via What Delicate Recordings. The album is available for pre-order now. Today, the band is thrilled to share the lead single, “Clear Notes For A New National Anthem,” which premiered at New Noise Magazine and is now available on all digital platforms for any playlist shares.
The creation of “Clear Notes For A New National Anthem” marks a departure from Becker’s usual solitary songwriting process.
Becker explains, “The track emerged from an experimental collaboration with L. Skell (songwriter behind the album, Eldridge Skell’s The Rude Staircase’s “Sookie Jump”), who came up from Central America to help produce the new batch of songs. My previous albums had been made, more or less, in complete solitude with no outside input, so Skell’s presence was a disruption to my normal process in and of itself. The framework of “Clear Notes…” had been sitting around for a while, but the song hadn’t really gone anywhere. So, we adopted an unconventional approach where we took turns working on the song for exactly one hour each, without revealing our changes to each other. And after a day of work, the song, which turned out completely different, finally took shape. As a final touch, I had Breck Brunson (former singer in my old band, Screens) add some ethereal background vocals and harmonies. Ultimately, the process breathed new life into a song that I had considered somewhat moribund and transformed it into something fresh.”
Human Potential is also announcing a show in Oakland, CA on October 12 at Thee Stork Club and are readying more shows for the fall. Follow the band on social media for information on additional upcoming shows.
Andrew Becker, an award-winning filmmaker and former drummer for Dischord Records’ band Medications and Brooklyn’s Screens, sought to challenge and reinvent his creative process with I Write Wedding Songs. Following the release of his fifth record, Hoosi, No!, Becker aimed to create an album that would upend his previous works both melodically and aesthetically. After extensive searching, he reconnected with old friend and wandering troubadour L. Skell. Together, they delved into a new creative process that involved rigorous parameters and unexpected collaborations.
The result of this innovative approach is I Write Wedding Songs, an album that showcases Human Potential’s most sonically diverse and intriguing work to date. With tracks like “Cut Worm Forgets the Plow,” which features a synth-pop anthem glazed with sampledelic elements, and “A Witch for Charlemagne,” which blends no wave scuzz with melodic peacocking, the album promises a unique listening experience. The title track, “I Write Wedding Songs,” leads listeners through a journey of lost loves and dreams, culminating in an emotionally climactic maelstrom.
Like all previous Human Potential album art, Becker dove into his archives for inspiration, this time pulling an image captured at his parents’ wedding reception many decades ago. The juxtaposition of the celebratory union with the divorce that would upend the marriage some years later embodies the idea that memories, moments, and life-defining songs shift tonally with the ebbs and flows that chart our existence.
I Write Wedding Songs is perhaps the most sonically sensuous and bafflingly palatable Human Potential album to date – a chimerical flavor rainbow of glistening, grimy, grandiose pop that inhales darkly and seethes brightly, welcoming all listeners to a shady place where joy and heartbreak dance together in a moonlit tide pool of teetering radiance.
