JACOB BRODOVSKY’S NEW ALBUM, TELL THE KIDS WE TRIED,
DUE OUT JULY 10, 2026
WATCH / SHARE “KIDS” HERE
BUY / STREAM “KIDS” HERE
PRE-SAVE TELL THE KIDS WE TRIED HERE
PERFORMING AT WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL
“Brodovsky makes music that feels conversational without ever losing its charge: Thoughtful, wry, big-hearted, and grounded in the kind of observations that linger long after the hook.” - Atwood Magazine
“Jacob Brodovsky spins mundane observations with imaginative insights, using lyrical richness and splashes of humour to paint in pensive musings and quirky, comforting colour” — Exclaim!
Photo Credit : Matt Horseman // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
Next month, Jacob Brodovsky will release his new record, Tell The Kids We Tried, produced by Gavin Gardiner and Champagne James Robinson (MOONRIIVR). Today, the award-winning indie-folk songwriter, based in Treaty 1 Territory, is sharing one more song before the album’s release. “Kids” started as “a writing exercise to try and write a song with the title ‘tell the kids we tried’. At the time, my son was 2 and we had just found out that we were having another kid. I was/am really struggling with the idea of bringing kids into the world while knowing how hellbent we are as a collective civilization on destroying it. For me, having children has been a massive source of both optimism and dread. Being around children and watching them discover themselves is such an incredible gift to behold, while also terrifying to realize all the ways they could hurt themselves and the limits of my own abilities to protect them.
The single arrives with a video featuring ‘archival footage’ of Jacob in his younger years. “I’ve always been addicted to attention from a very young age,” he explains. “I’ve definitely passed that trait onto my kids. I asked my folks if they had any footage of me from childhood putting on shows in our living room and my dad dropped off a hard drive with a literal terabyte of footage of me lip synching in my living room. The idea for video is to kind of poke fun at myself and the fact that very little has changed. I’m still addicted to attention, I’m still putting on shows, and I’m still pretty shameless about it all.”
WATCH / SHARE “KIDS” HERE
BUY / STREAM “KIDS” HERE
MORE ABOUT JACOB BRODOVSKY & TELL THE KIDS WE TRIED
In some cases, songwriters discover their writing is premonition only after living through the experiences their past-self penned. In 2025, Jacob Brodovsky lived through a loss of community that, at the time, he didn’t realize he’d foretold while writing his upcoming sophomore LP, Tell The Kids We Tried.
He began recording with a group of trusted friends and heroes. He brought a batch of songs to producers Gavin Gardiner and Champagne James Robinson, only to quickly discard many of them in favour of brand new songs stemming from a ‘Song Every Week’ songwriting challenge that the Winnipeg music community takes part in every Winter.
Without time to edit or really even think about them, these eleven songs revealed themselves to be more vulnerable and personal than previous work. With the help of John Mark Baron (Begonia, William Prince), Jason Tait (The Weakerthans, Bahamas), Keiran Placetka (Leith Ross, William Prince, Bros. Landreth), Charlotte Cornfield, Dominique Adams (Leith Ross, Madeleine Roger), and Taylor Jackson, they recorded live to an 8-track tape machine, quickly capturing the true expression of each song and being forced to commit to creative decisions in the moment.
WATCH / SHARE “PAST MISTAKES” HERE
BUY / STREAM “PAST MISTAKES” HERE
After spending the vast majority of his life in the Jewish Summer Camp world, including becoming Co-Executive Director with his wife of the popular local community camp they met at over 25 years ago, political tensions forced him to walk away from both what he thought was his life’s work, and the community he grew up in just days after the birth of their second son. Many tracks like “Kids”, “Beneath It All”, “It’s Alright”, “Lack Thereof”, and “Older, Too” foreshadowed the upcoming loss of community that Jacob would experience while his child was being born.
WATCH / SHARE “COLORADO LOW” HERE
BUY / STREAM “COLORADO LOW” HERE
The political and personal impacts live in each song, sharing the sense of loss and confusion Brodovsky felt through the process. At the same time, the collection of songs shares more hope than disappointment. With a close listen, many songs show the importance of finding true community, seeing good in tough situations, and learning to feel less allergic to growing up and getting older.
On one level, the album is a clear message to Jacob’s former campers and staff. On another level, telling the kids we tried is directed at his own two children, hoping for understanding as to why he’s raising them in a world that’s getting harder and harder to believe in.
Finally, it’s a reminder for all of us as we try to carve space for kindness and community in an increasingly bleak time. Please, tell them we tried.
PRE-SAVE TELL THE KIDS WE TRIED HERE
TOUR DATES
Jun 24 - Winnipeg, MB - MBF Farm Tour # %
Jun 26 - Regina, SK - MBF Farm Tour # %
Jun 27 - Saskatoon, SK - MBF Farm Tour # %
Jul 09-12 - Winnipeg, MB - Winnipeg Folk Festival
Jul 25–27 - Lac du Bonnet, MB - Fire And Water Festival
Aug 14-17 - Ear Falls, ON - Trout Forest Music Festival #
Oct 22 - Toronto, ON - The Burdock
% Supporting Michael Bernard Fitzgerald
# Performing as Dom + Jacob (with Dominique Adams)
TELL THE KIDS WE TRIED TRACKLIST
01 Past Mistakes
02 Colorado Low
03 Kids
04 Restaurant
05 Older Too
06 Intermission
07 Lack Thereof (with Dominique Adams)
08 Downer
09 Beneath It All (with Charlotte Cornfield)
10 Winters (with MOONRIIVR)
11 It's Alright (with Dominique Adams and Taylor Jackson)
JACOB BRODOVSKY ONLINE
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