ADAM BALDWIN ANNOUNCES NEW ALBUM
AWARD-WINNING DARTMOUTH-BASED MUSICIAN AND SONGWRITER TO RELEASE NO TELLING WHEN (PRECISELY NINETEEN EIGHTY-FIVE) ON JUNE 24 VIA SONIC RECORDS
PHOTO CREDIT: JEFF COOKE
Adam Baldwin is perhaps best known as a member of Matt Mays’ band, however the Dartmouth based musician has already been awarded Nova Scotia Music Week’s Male Artist Recording Of The Year on the back of his 2013 solo EP. Now the songwriter is ready to reveal his first LP, No Telling When (Precisely Nineteen Eighty-Five), set for release on June 24 via Sonic Records.
Produced by Liam O’Neil (The Stills, Metric) the album also features the talents of Josh Trager (Sam Roberts Band), Brian Murphy (Alvvays) and Leah Fay (July Talk). The first single “Daylight” was inspired by the lead up to the last federal election in Canada, occurring during the recording sessions. “It’s a song about both the unity and division we felt as a country,” says Baldwin. “It’s a song that should remind us that this change was spurred by a desire for a different direction, and that while our course appears to have changed, we have to demand that it continue to do so.”
During Baldwin’s time recording the album in Toronto, the country’s political turmoil was coupled with the Blue Jays dramatic playoff run. “Toronto was alive... indeed, Canada was alive,” says Baldwin. “I walked down Dundas and Ossington every day to the studio and passed hundreds of election signs. You could feel the hope and you could feel the fear. It was on everyone's tongue. If folks weren't talking about the election, they were talking about baseball. The Toronto Blue Jays, an entity that falls just below rock and roll in terms of my devotion, had ended a playoff drought that almost precedes my memory. The Jays' run into the American League Championship Series was the perfect foil for the very stressful federal election.”
The title track and first song “No Telling When (Precisely Nineteen Eighty-Five)” describes events in New York City in 1985, the year before Adam was born, and suggests how, thirty years on, not a lot in our culture has really changed. A particular unnamed real-estate developer, reality TV star, and politician personifies this idea.
“Anytime” and “Sparrow Song”, both featuring back up vocals from Leah Fay, loosely form a two act play and the centre piece of the album. In “Anytime” Adam sings about young love and all the hopes and fears that come with that, while “Sparrow Song” describes those fears when they become reality.
“Rehtaeh” is about the systemic failures that led to the death of Rehtaeh Parsons in 2013 and is, as Adam puts it “maybe the most important song I'll ever write.”
The album closes with “Living Proof”, a song about the Canadian Dream, and how as Adam points out, “the dream is elusive because it isn't made available to everyone. It can't be attained by just anyone.”
