CHARLOTTE DAY WILSON ANNOUNCES DELUXE VERSION OF DEBUT ALBUM ALPHA

2022 US TOUR DATES NOW ANNOUNCED

BUY / STREAM ALPHA (DELUXE)

PRE-ORDER THE ALPHA (DELUXE) VINYL

2022 US TOUR DATE TICKETS HERE

“The immaculately mixed ALPHA is instead built on weighty writing and daring arrangements in which Day Wilson stays front and center, never allowing the production to overshadow her presence.” - PITCHFORK

Wilson has always had an uncannily evocative voice, the kind that leaves listeners spellbound, and an ability to write gut-wrenching songs, but this debut album feels like a homecoming. Gospel, folk, alt-R&B and neo-soul influences abound as she stretches the limits of her alto and quickly proves there are none.” - CBC MUSIC, #2 Canadian Album of the Year

"Her debut full-length is all her—vocally forward and lyrically bare. The songs are centered on Wilson’s rich, soulful voice, giving her tracks the intimacy of a private performance, while also boasting dense, artful production." - BANDCAMP

“a richly textured and starkly honest record anchored by Wilson's full-bodied vocals and uncompromising lyrics.” - EXCLAIM!

"...a singular creative force. A singer-songwriter who records and produces her own work with a tenacious yet flexible vision....Alpha is not so much an announcement of a prodigious new talent, as it is a confirmation of one." - FADER

"Wilson occupies a lane distinct from most burgeoning R&B stars and often allows her soulful music to be the center of attention. Wilson’s sound fills a space entirely its own, setting up the Toronto-born songwriter as one of this year’s most promising up-and-coming R&B acts....what is perhaps most striking about Wilson doesn’t involve her voice, but rather her production." - BILLBOARD

PHOTO CREDIT: Othello Grey // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES


Today, the Toronto-based musician and producer Charlotte Day Wilson released the deluxe edition of her breakthrough debut album ALPHA. The deluxe edition expands on the sonic narrative Charlotte introduced with the initial release of ALPHA by including an unreleased track "Even Is the Lie" and the remix of "Take Care of You" featuring King Princess, Meshell Ndegeocello, and Amaarae that was previously exclusively on Amazon. ALPHA (Deluxe) is out on all digital streaming platforms, with the vinyl edition of the album now available for pre-orders.

BUY / STREAM ALPHA (DELUXE)

PRE-ORDER THE ALPHA (DELUXE) VINYL

Charlotte Day Wilson will also embark on a headlining US tour in 2022. Full tour dates are listed below. Tickets will go on sale to the general public this Friday, December 3 at 10 AM local time.

2022 US TOUR DATE TICKETS HERE

ALPHA is an euphoric blend of R&B, jazz, and soul music. The album amassed critical acclaim from the likes of Pitchfork, Billboard, FADER, Okay Player, and more. Charlotte made waves in the industry with the release of her debut EP CDW in 2016, along with her collaborations with BADBADNOTGOOD, Daniel Caesar, and Kaytranada. She made a return in 2018 with the poignant Stone Woman EP. Most recently, Drake sampled her song "Mountains" in his track "Fair Trade" (featuring Travis Scott) released on his album Certified Love Boy. With the release of ALPHA, Wilson established herself as a worldwide name.

WATCH AND SHARE “IF I COULD” VIDEO

WATCH AND SHARE “KEEP MOVING”

WATCH AND SHARE “CHANGES” VIDEO

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ALPHA (DELUXE) TRACKLIST:
1. Strangers
2. I Can Only Whisper (feat. BADBADNOTGOOD)
3. If I Could
4. Lovesick Utopia
5. Mountains
6. Danny’s Interlude
7. Changes
8. Take Care of You (feat. Syd)
9. Keep Moving
10. Wish it Was Easy
11. Adam Complex
12. Even is the Lie
13. Take Care of You Remix (Feat. King Princess, Amaarae & Meshell Ndegeocello)
14. If I Could (Music Video)
15. Keep Moving (Music Video)
16. Changes (Music Video)


2022 US TOUR DATES
March 2 - Detroit, MI
March 3 - Chicago, IL
March 5 - Philadelphia, PA
March 6 - Washington D.C
March 8 - New York, NY
March 10 - Atlanta, GA
March 12 - Dallas, TX
March 13 - Houston, TX
March 16 - Las Vegas, NV
March 17 - Los Angeles, CA
March 20 - Santa Ana, CA
March 21 - Oakland, CA
March 23 - Portland, OR
March 24 - Seattle, WA

PURCHASE TICKETS:
https://charlottedaywilson.com/Tour

CHARLOTTE DAY WILSON ONLINE
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BEGONIA SHARES NEW SINGLE / VIDEO FOR “HEAVEN”, ANNOUNCES 2022 TOUR DATES

WATCH AND SHARE “HEAVEN” HERE

BUY / STREAM “HEAVEN” HERE

2022 TOUR DATES BEGIN MARCH 2, 2022 - MORE DATES TO BE ANNOUNCED

Photo Credit : Calvin Lee Joseph // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, Begonia (Alexa Dirks) is announcing her long-awaited upcoming tour dates for 2022 and is also sharing the new single “Heaven”, a track that finds beauty in the unknown. “When I was a kid I thought I knew a lot about everything,” says Dirks. “I was taught to believe that there was always a right or wrong and beyond that, that there was a heaven and hell waiting for us after we die and we just had to live our lives accordingly to end up in either place. I had a lot of fear of screwing up and a lot of fear of the unknown. As I've grown, all of those binary ways of thinking have more or less been shattered. I've come to understand that I'll always be searching and that there's a lot of beauty to that. I still think about what happens after we die but I feel more curious about it than I feel afraid or certain of it. I think this song speaks to that doubt and curiosity: thoughts I used to struggle with but now fully embrace”

“Heaven” arrives complete with a video from director Gwen Truntau and videographer Mike Maryniuk. “We filmed the video in rural Manitoba on the same property where we wrote the song years earlier,” Dirks continues. “I had asked Gwen to meet with me to talk about video ideas and I had mentioned that I wanted to be in the back of a truck. She said ‘why don't we make the back of the truck your bedroom?’ and then we just kept riffing from there. The property we filmed on had so much space to work with and sweet animals to film. I truly hope there are regal donkeys and fluffy chickens in the afterlife. 

We filmed in the midst of changing covid restrictions about a year ago, working with a wonderful small crew to make it happen. Mike shot it and Gwen directed. They are partners in real life and my real life partner Seth Woodyard also worked on this with us to build the set pieces. So it was kind of like a giant fucked up double date, haha. We basically just tried to embrace the trance-like dreaminess that the song invokes.”

WATCH AND SHARE “HEAVEN” HERE

BUY / STREAM “HEAVEN” HERE

“Heaven” Single Artwork // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

MORE ABOUT BEGONIA
As Begonia, Alexa Dirks is bold, brazen with her florid, surprising pop that is tempered with sensitivity and wisdom. In her music, Begonia leans hard into a sense of arrival. Whether it’s learning to come into her own or processing a brutal heartbreak, Dirks’ intimate lyrics and audacious sound allows for her audience to relate to the messiness of life with an honesty that is refreshing. 

Her debut LP, Fear, was nominated for a JUNO Award for Adult Alternative Album Of The Year and was longlisted for The Polaris Music Prize. It was one of Exclaim!’s Most Underrated Albums of the Year, made end of the year lists from CBC Music and Dominionated, and saw both “Beats” and “Hanging On A Line” named as CBC Music Top 20 Fan Favourites of the year. Fear also spent 10 straight weeks as the #1 album in Canada on Earshot’s Top 50 chart. 

Fear was written and co-produced with a familiar team of Matt Schellenberg (Royal Canoe) and Matt Peters (Royal Canoe) along with Marcus Paquin (The National, Arcade Fire, Local Natives).

Dirks' first solo EP, Lady in Mind, was well-received, being listed on NPR’s 10 Artists You Need To Know in 2017 and single “Juniper” reached #1 on the CBC Radio 2 Top 20. Noisey wrote that, “Begonia has one of Canada’s most extraordinary voices, and thankfully she uses it to obliterate the misery from this world one live performance at a time.” NPR wrote that Begonia is “the place where synth-pop meets old soul and scrappy meets sexy."

WATCH AND SHARE “FEAR” HERE

PRAISE FOR FEAR

“With its twin-helix bind of sharp pop and warm soul, Fear positions Winnipeg's Begonia (Alexa Dirks) as a powerhouse on the Prairies.” - Exclaim!

“Fear is the opposite of all its name implies: confident, bold, and blossoming with subtlety and intelligence.” - Dominionated

“...Fear still manages to make you feel like you've been let in on pop's best-kept secret. But, not for long. 2019 might have refreshed our memory of Dirks' vast capabilities, but 2020 will hopefully deliver her the global recognition she deserves.” - CBC Music

“...searing and dignified” - NPR Music

"...a complex, powerhouse synth-soul that hangs on one of Canada’s most
extraordinary voices." - Line Of Best Fit

"an audacious adventure in modern soul, with gospel inspirations and updated takes on finger-snapping Motown pop and late 20th-century R&B.‎" - Globe & Mail

WATCH CBC’S FIRST PLAY LIVE HERE

BUY / STREAM FEAR HERE

2022 TOUR DATES
Mar 2 - Fargo, ND @ The Hall at Fargo Brewing Co
Mar 3 - Minneapolis, MN @ 7th Street Entry
Mar 6 - Chicago, IL @ Schuba’s
Mar 10 - New York, NY @ Elsewhere Zone One
Mar 11 - Philadelphia, PA @ Milkboy
Mar 12 - Washington, DC @ Pie Shop
Mar 14 - Nashville, TN @ Drkmttr
Mar 15 - New Orleans, LA @ Gasa Gasa
Mar 20 - Hot Springs, AR @ Valley of the Vapors Festival

BEGONIA ONLINE
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KILLBEAT MUSIC’S 2021 YEAR IN REVIEW

We closed our 2020 year-end round up with a “See you at a show in the future. Fingers crossed.” And while 2021 wasn’t exactly a good time for everyone, we are, slowly, starting to see each other again in dark, basement bars and in the padded seats of ornate theatres, celebrating music in person once again.

2021 began with The Weather Station’s new album, Ignorance, which found itself not only shortlisted for the Polaris Music Prize, but also garnered an appearance on NPR’s Tiny Desk series, and accolades from press across the country. The Polaris long-list also included celebrated albums from Allison Russell (Outside Child) and Bernice (Eau de bonjorno). Recently, Allison’s Russell’s Outside Child was also nominated for 3 awards at the 2022 GRAMMY’s as was Steven Wilson’s The Future Bites.

Both The Weather Station and Allison Russell were invited to join Tom Power on CBC’s q along with Vancouver comedian Seán Devlin (叶 世民) with his album Animals, Airports., the first comedy release on Arts & Crafts.

LISTEN TO KILLBEAT MUSIC’S SINGLES OF 2021 PLAYLIST

CBC Music kept the airwaves vibrating with tracks from Charlotte Day Wilson’s Alpha, Kiwi Jr.’s Cooler Returns, Ariel Posen’s Headways, and the debut single from Charlie Houston, “Calls”, all ending up in the Top 20.

Charlotte Day Wilson and Kiwi Jr. both ended up with #1 records on Canadian College campuses for a few weeks this year along with Andy Shauf’s Wilds, Ada Lea’s one hand on the steering wheel the other sewing a garden, and Chad Van Gaalen’s World’s Most Stressed Out Gardener (which wins the most aptly titled lock down record title in our list).

This year also saw the re-emergence of Whoop-SZO as Status / Non-Status, with their EP 1, 2, 3, 4, 500 Years; watched Yves Jarvis unite with Romy Lightman (Tasseomancy) to form Lightman Jarvis Ecstatic Band and release their debut album Banned; and got to listen in as Helena Deland and Ouri combined their divergent songwriting styles into Hildegard and shared their self-titled debut album. All of those records ended up this year in the Top 10 on Earshot’s National Charts, as did Aasiva’s Niriunniq, Homeshake’s Under The Weather, Cots’ Disturbing Body, and Charles Spearin’s My City Of Starlings. 

The Earshot Hip-Hop charts saw Top 10 placements from two Peanuts and Corn Records releases this year : Bazooka Joe 204’s Prairie Nilsson, detailing a life well-wasted in Winnipeg’s drinking holes and dark alleys, and bigmcenroe’s trip down memory lane - the Brandon LP.

Ouri’s solo record Frame Of A Fauna also topped Earshot’s Electronic Top 10 list together with Absolutely Free’s most recent LP, Aftertouch, who’s single “How To Paint Clouds” also wound up on CBC Radio 3’s Top 10. Previously in the year, the R3 Top 10 also included Touching’s “Tony Called The Muscle”, Astral Swans’ “Flood”, Debra-Jean Creelman’s “Muse Needs A Wife”, and Jason Collett’s collaboration with Andy Shauf, “Crab Walking Home In The Rain”.

You may have also caught Jason’s single on SiriusXM’s North Americana channel as featured on their Sunday Service program along with tracks from Charlotte Cornfield’s newly released record Highs In The Minuses and Megan Nash’s Soft Focus Futures. On North Americana you would also hear the musical stylings of Toronto’s Alyson McNamara and her track “Shutting Down” (from Let Me Sleep), a song which Odario also added to his playlist at CBC Afterdark. That playlist also includes entries from Dana Sipos’ album The Astral Plane, Silver Pools Chroma, and Jasper Sloan Yip’s double EP, Strange Calm / Blushing Autumn.

And should you forget to turn off the radio / phone after dark, you’d encounter tracks from Julie Stone’s Sixty Summers and Treephones’ Pink Objects on CBC Overnight. Now, should you have left the stream of music on until Sunday’s cornerstone, The Strombo Show, you would have also caught the premiere of new music from Nick Ferrio’s Television Of Roses and Joseph Shabason’s The Fellowship. And you’d hear new music for the first time in 10 years from Strippers Union, the duo of The Tragically Hip’s Rob Baker and The Odds’ Craig Northey.

LISTEN TO KILLBEAT MUSIC’S SINGLES OF 2021 PLAYLIST

2021 marked 20 years since the release of Gord Downie’s astonishing solo record, Coke Machine Glow. Arts and Crafts released a special expanded reissue that posthumously revisits the songs and poetry of this prolific period of Downie’s career entitled Coke Machine Glow : The Songwriter’s Cabal.

It’s coming to the end of 2021 and while we don’t have to cross our fingers as tightly as last year, it sure is nice to see you all again, even if somehow some of the venues still smell like lukewarm beer and frozen burritos through a mask. Oh and hey, buy a record or two while you’re there.