BEGONIA RELEASES MARIGOLD EP, INCLUDING AN EXTENDED VERSION AND REMIXES BY DEADMEN, SUN SUN, AND MA BWE
LISTEN / BUY / STREAM MARIGOLD EP HERE
WATCH / SHARE “MARIGOLD” EXTENDED VERSION HERE
LATEST LP, POWDER BLUE, SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 POLARIS MUSIC PRIZE - PERFORMING AT THE POLARIS GALA SEP 19 AT TORONTO’S MASSEY HALL
FALL TOUR DATES BEGIN WITH ‘FAKE VEGAS RESIDENCY’ IN WINNIPEG SEP 22
TICKETS AVAILABLE HERE
BUY / STREAM POWDER BLUE HERE
“Powder Blue presents Begonia in vulnerable pop-music poses, at turns bubbly, fancy, funky and intimate.” - The Globe & Mail
"Begonia’s signature smooth vocals drive the tender and soulful pop songs with an R&B flair that touch on every corner of her life.” - CBC Music
“The record puts Begonia's internal world on full display, a complex and beautiful diorama dressed by her impeccable vocals and sparse, inventive production — Alexa Dirks has always felt fully formed, but on Powder Blue, she transcends.” - Exclaim!
Photo Credit : Calvin Lee Joseph // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
Next week, Begonia will be performing at the Polaris Music Prize Gala where her latest album, Powder Blue, has been shortlisted for the prestigious award. Whittled down to 10 nominees from over 200 Canadian albums considered, the prize will be handed out at the event which will also be televised courtesy of CBC on Tuesday, September 19.
Today, Begonia (aka, Alexa Dirks) is dropping a new EP that explores a few different iterations of “Marigold”. In addition to an extended cut of the song, the EP also features a guitarmony-laced upbeat reimagining from deadmen, a trip-hop vibe-dive with SUN SUN, and a French House reimagining for the dancefloor from MA BWE. "Marigold is basically a short story about my teenage life,” says Dirks. “A passing reflection that has confirmed for me that all the questions and uncertainties I had as a kid, have value.
WATCH / SHARE “MARIGOLD” EXTENDED VERSION HERE
“I think It's the shortest song I've ever written yet it always felt like such a big song to me. Sharing parts of myself that I haven't really shared in my music before...mainly the relationship I have to my queerness and my loss of religion. I think subconsciously part of me kept it so short because I was a little afraid of it. Once the album was mastered I had a panic and felt like I had to send a mass email to any person that knew me before like ‘to whom it may concern, I am not straight and I don't believe in the same God anymore. We good?’ Haha, I can't fully describe it but it was like I had a fear of being ‘exposed’ or people questioning me or being disappointed in me. I don't love that I felt that way but it's the truth.
“A song ALWAYS takes on a new meaning to me once we play it live and so we started playing it on tour and all my fears melted away. I watched people singing…and sometimes screaming… the lyrics back to me every night and it lit up something in my brain and my heart honestly. The more I sang it the more I felt like I could say more, I wanted to say more. That I feel so lucky be accepted and loved by all of you special people and that the takeaway is more like...puberty is fucked, life can be fucked but in spite of it all flowers keep growing and so do we."
LISTEN / BUY / STREAM MARIGOLD EP HERE
This Fall, Begonia will be taking Powder Blue from a fake Vegas residency in Winnipeg to the clubs of Europe. Beginning with her hometown release show on September 22 and 23, Begonia will host her own ‘Vegas Residency’ at Winnipeg’s Club Regent Casino and follow up with a run of dates throughout Canada before joining Leith Ross overseas. Full tour dates can be found below and tickets to all dates are available here.
If you haven’t yet had the chance to perform a track from Powder Blue at your local karaoke establishment, Begonia is here to help. Recently, she shared a few interactive videos via her socials produced by Nick Luchak for “Marigold”, “Butterfly”, “Right Here” and “Married By Elvis”. "I used to host karaoke at a bar called The Good Will before I felt confident enough to start this project 6/7 years ago,” says Dirks. “Watching other people experience so much JOY and just the beautiful comradery/absurdity of it all...IT IS MY FAVOURITE. So naturally we had our pal Nick Luchak make some sweetly unhinged karaoke videos for some tracks from Powder Blue." Begonia is inviting fans to remix them/duet them/sing along and to tag her so “I can admire and cry and repost!”
POWDER BLUE KARAOKE VIDEOS HERE
MORE ABOUT POWDER BLUE
On the album’s name, Dirks says, “Powder Blue is more of an emotion. It makes me think of my baby blanket, the colour of the virgin mary’s shawl at the church Christmas play, the airiness of clouds on a summer day, chlorine filled water in a hotel pool, Elvis in the 70s wearing an ill-fitting jumpsuit, the wallpaper in my room growing up, the collection of faded denim jackets in my basement.”
WATCH / SHARE “MARRIED BY ELVIS” HERE
“The name of this album needed to be something that encompasses all of the feelings that these songs give me when they are put together,” Dirks continues. “When I listen to them as a unit, they send me back to the words, the colour. To me, this album holds a muted nostalgia, musings on childhood, the complexities of new love, self love, religion, virginity, and sexuality. There’s an indulgence in emotional depth and pain yet also an indulgence in love and a poppy lightness—two sides I’ve always tried to balance. I feel like I let my guard down even more with this record and decided to not hold back on either end.”
LISTEN TO BEGONIA TALK WITH TOM POWER ABOUT POWDER BLUE AND MORE HERE
WATCH / SHARE “MARRIED BY ELVIS” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “RIGHT HERE” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “COLD NIGHT” HERE
BUY / STREAM POWDER BLUE HERE
MARIGOLD TRACKLIST
01 Marigold (Extended)
02 Marigold (Album Version)
03 Marigold (deadmen Remix)
04 Marigold (SUN SUN Remix)
05 Marigold (MA BWE Remix)
TOUR DATES
Sept 22 - Winnipeg, MB @ Club Regent Casino
Sept 23 - Winnipeg, MB @ Club Regent Casino
Oct 10 - Edmonton, AB @ Starlite Room
Oct 11 - Calgary, AB @ The Grand
Oct 12 - Regina, SK @ The Artesian
Oct 15 - Saskatoon, SK @ Broadway Theatre
Oct 28 - Rotterdam, NL @ Rotown ^
Oct 29 - Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso THT ^
Oct 30 - Brussels, BE @ AB Club ^
Nov 1 - Birmingham, UK @ Institute 2 ^
Nov 3 - Dublin, IE @ Vicar St. ^
Nov 5 - Manchester, UK @ New Century ^
Nov 6 - Glasgow, UK @ St. Lukes ^
Nov 7 - Edinburgh, UK @ Summerhall ^
Nov 14 - Berlin, DE @ Berghain Kantine ^
Nov 15 - Hamburg, DE @ Nachtwache ^
Nov 16 - Cologne, DE @ Arttheatre ^
Nov 19 - London, UK @ KOKO ^
^ supporting Leith Ross