Originally released in the spring of 2016, ten years have passed since the arrival of singer-songwriter Andy Shauf’s seminal album The Party. To commemorate a decade of these classic, lived-in songs, The Party (10th Anniversary Edition) will be released on October 16 on double vinyl with nine additional tracks accompanying the original studio version, including three never-before-released songs plus alternate cuts and demo recordings. The bonus material will be made available as a digital release titled the afterparty, also due October 16.

‘I know it's a fight / and I know that I’m losing’ Shauf sullenly ponders on “losing”, one of the three previously unreleased tracks. Coming home from the party, the song’s narrator has arrived at their partner’s place a little too drunk a few too many times.

In a new essay reflecting on this period of his life, Shauf looks back with a clarity he didn’t have at the time:

“The Party was written when I was in my mid-twenties and was released a few days before I turned twenty-nine. This time feels like a lost period for me. I was on the road in North America and Europe consistently, ‘partying’ a lot, letting alcohol lead me to experiences I thought necessary for having something to write about. My dream of becoming a touring musician and recording artist was starting to play out, but I avoided acknowledging that reality out of fear that it would vanish. It’s clearer now that this avoidance more so gave me an inability to see myself as the destructive force at the center of the chaos beginning to surround me.

“The Party didn’t happen because I knew what I was doing, it happened because I kept making mistakes. Four years of trying and trying again until eventually the happy accidents added up to something cohesive. It was a process of learning, like anything is. If I’d taken the same revisionist approach to my real life, maybe the lost period wouldn’t have stretched out for so long. Mistakes made in songs led to new arrangements and new approaches, mistakes in life led to more and more confusion and hurt. Thankfully life has allowed me the time to learn that I was simply lucky to have been given the chance to explore at all.” Read the essay in full at andyshauf.com.

With The Party Shauf masterfully creates a cast of memorable and unique characters. They show up “Early to the Party,” reveal secrets (“To You”) or try to reveal nothing (“The Magician”). In ‘a city the size of a dinner plate,’ everyone knew the guy who keeled over after smoking what he promised would be his last pack of cigarettes (“Alexander All Alone”). There’s the girl dancing by herself in the middle of the room, with the “Eyes of Them All” upon her. One moment you’re dancing with someone who bears an uncanny resemblance to your ex (“Martha Sways”) and later slagging your best friend as a way of endearing yourself to his recently dumped ex (“Quite Like You”). All of this is set to ornate arrangements of fuzzed-out guitars, string sections, clarinets and dreamy synths; all draped over delicate piano, acoustic guitars and rainy-day drums.