GEORGIA HARMER REVEALS “TALAMANCA” FROM UPCOMING LP

LISTEN / SHARE “TALAMANCA” HERE
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DEBUT LP, STAY IN TOUCH, OUT APRIL 22, 2022 VIA ARTS & CRAFTS

PRE-SAVE STAY IN TOUCH HERE

"one song in, it's clear that she possesses the kind of effortless musical ability that comes from a life surrounded by great art. ...a Big Thief and Phoebe Bridgers-sounding reflection on youthful abandon and the incomparable presence that accompanies it." - CBC Music on "Headrush"

“For Georgia Harmer, it’s a matter of when, not if. The Toronto songwriter’s serene debut single, ‘Headrush,’ displays a rare skill for wrestling obvious emotion — in this case, naked nostalgia — into sound.” - SPIN, 22 Artists to Watch in 2022

“With her recent singles ‘Headrush' and ‘Austin,' the Toronto singer-songwriter Georgia Harmer established herself as a noteworthy talent.” - Stereogum

“[‘Austin’] recalls Feist or Land of Talk with extra rootsy guitar twang.” - Brooklyn Vegan

"Harmer gets grittier on “Austin”, and this side of her is awesome. A grizzled guitar opens the track before a steel guitar and rhythms join the fray. This is the sound of a world that is dark and full of mystery and uncertainty." - The Revue on "Austin"

Photo Credit: Gemma Warren // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Twenty-two year-old Toronto-based musician Georgia Harmer presents a gorgeous new single, “Talamanca”, from her debut album, Stay in Touch, out April 22 on Arts & Crafts. For Harmer, music has always been a way “to process what was going on under the surface of a moment, a way for me to understand in retrospect what something meant.” The tone is set with album opener “Talamanca”, a song that begins with a story about a trip to Mexico and expands to encompass the communion that can occur between close friends— ‘Speaking without words/ Languages of seeing and being seen.’ The arrangement is built around Harmer’s evocative voice and bass harmonics contributed by Ben Whiteley (The Weather Station, Julia Jacklin) with reverb giving the song a dream-like texture to reflect Harmer lyrically moving through her memories. A counterpoint to the electricity of her earlier singles, "Talamanca" hones in on the roots of Georgia's music and her striking voice. 

LISTEN / SHARE “TALAMANCA” HERE
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Harmer elaborates: “This song came out of me in a day in Costa Rica, and voice memos named it ‘Talamanca’ because that’s where we were staying. I loved the name partly because it was one of the few places I'd had time to think that year. I was on the road with Alessia Cara, nearing what I didn't yet know would be the end of that chapter, and missing my ‘old life.’ I went back to a memory of being in Mexico with two of my close friends. Every morning we’d sit on the roof of the neighboring house as the sun rose and drink our coffee, eat our breakfast, and bask in the rising light. We were very connected at the time and had a telepathic quality to our communication. This song is essentially about the telepathy and mind-reading that goes on between close friends.”

WATCH / SHARE “ALL IN MY MIND” HERE
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MORE ABOUT STAY IN TOUCH

Across Stay in Touch, Harmer captures ineffable moments with expressive detail: the euphoric memory of a summer’s day so perfect you want to live inside it forever, the dusty heat of a Texas afternoon, a tingle of melancholy on a solo walk home after a party. With a wisdom and poise that belies her youthful age, Harmer has penned an emotionally resonant collection of songs that articulate the ways in which even the most fleeting experiences can forge bonds between strangers, create families out of friends, and one by one form the joys and sorrows that make up a life.

WATCH / SHARE “HEADRUSH” HERE
BUY / STREAM “HEADRUSH” HERE

Harmer has been making music since childhood, recording her own songs since age 10. She hails from an artistic family, including her aunt and labelmate Sarah Harmer (Georgia’s parents, both professional musicians, met while playing in Sarah’s band). While still a teenager, she hit the road as a backing vocalist for Alessia Cara, touring and playing late night TV for many months. But when it came time to make her own album, Harmer knew she needed to find her own people. After dropping out of university to pursue music full-time, Harmer began jamming with jazz students at Humber College in Toronto; guitarist Dylan Burchell, drummer Julian Psihogios, and bassist David Maclean, and engineer/producer Jasper Smith assembled to record at ArtHaus in Dufferin Grove. “It was nice because we could just play how we’re used to playing, crammed in a room together, and capture the natural feeling of that.” Smith didn’t tell Harmer that he had never engineered a record before until after it was complete.

LISTEN / SHARE “AUSTIN” HERE
BUY / STREAM “AUSTIN” HERE

Stay in Touch spans everything from intimate folk and strummy country to sophisticated jazz and pop-kissed rock. Harmer and her band created musical landscapes that live up to the lyrical richness of the songs. The record sparkles with the lightning in a bottle feel of a band in thrall to their musical chemistry, adding more depth to the record’s themes. Stay in Touch is inspired both by the relationships of Harmer’s past and the joy of finding your people in the here and now. It’s an unforgettable statement from a new artist with a heartbreakingly simple message: when you stay in touch with the experiences that have shaped you, you stay in touch with yourself. 

PRE-SAVE STAY IN TOUCH HERE

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STAY IN TOUCH TRACKLIST
1. Talamanca
2. Headrush
3. Know You Forever
4. Austin
5. All in My Mind
6. Be Here
7. Homes
8. Top Down
9. Go Soft
10. Strongest Person
11. Just the Feeling

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EDWIN RAPHAEL RETURNS WITH NEW SINGLE / VIDEO

WATCH / SHARE “HAVE YOU BEEN TOLD” HERE
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"Raphael's languid instrumentals are all too easy to melt into." - Exclaim!

"Raphael indulges by opening up that affecting guitar-vocal pairing to a lush bridge with added horn, guitar and drums." - CBC Music

"The track seemingly blooms from a spacious and rustic folk sound into something far more lavish." - Under The Radar

"Tranquil melodies flow over electronic and acoustic instrumentation." - American Songwriter

Video Still

Today, Dubai-born, Montreal-based songwriter Edwin Raphael shares his first single and video of 2022. “Have You Been Told” is a track that “steers through the fixation of constant repetitive cycles from a place that is ‘all blown up’ to ‘all so bare’,” says Edwin. “It’s the conflicting pursuit of stimulation vs stability. The phrase ‘have you been told’ suggests the idea of keeping the devil on your shoulder at ease by satisfying it in small doses as well as constantly sort of reminding yourself to check yourself. Essentially the song explores a medium ground where there is a balance between the two.”

The single arrives today complete with a video directed by Raphael, Jonathan Frydman, and Ben Del Vasto. “The music video matches both the spiraling instrumentation of the song and Raphael’s lyrical vision, showing him navigating between two different worlds,” notes Complex. 

“The vision for the music video was to find a visual language that expressed what I felt when I heard the song,” says Bel Vasto. “As production went along the vision changed slightly but what remained and what was later found in the editing room was the story of our protagonist existing in two different settings/worlds, with fragments from each informing the other.  A mix between a dream and a journey.”

Frydman adds, “Edwin and I really tried to put forward a strong narrative for the song and with the song being this hypnotic loop, it was essential to flow in tandem with the various melodies on display. What we came up with was a storyline where the protagonist finds himself in between two places connected through a portal (the painting), where he realizes neither world is quite right as much as he'd like to believe it. The balance has to be found within oneself.”

WATCH / SHARE “HAVE YOU BEEN TOLD” HERE
BUY / STREAM “HAVE YOU BEEN TOLD” HERE

“Have You Been Told” Single Artwork // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

MORE ABOUT EDWIN RAPHAEL
How do you anchor yourself when occupying multiple geographic identities at once? For Edwin Raphael, it requires an intentional and intensive form of world-building. By developing an unmistakable style of folk that merges Eastern scales with the Western pop canon, Raphael reimagines his music as a exploratory tool that allows him to construct an interior and sacred home to retreat into. 

Growing up in Dubai, as the son of parents who immigrated from the city of Cochin in India’s coastal Kerala state, Raphael studied classical guitar before deciding on the keys. As he developed an affinity for John Mayer and Ben Howard, he felt at odds with Dubai’s distinct sense of “placelessness” — and the bewildering feeling of being immersed in a culture where everyone claimed an alternate homeland. It wasn’t until he moved to Montreal to pursue a business degree that he felt a sense of stability, and became deeply entangled with the city’s indie bedroom pop scene.

His debut EP Ocean’s Walk (2015) paired stirring, melancholic instrumentals with a fierce self-reckoning. It would set the stage for a string of releases that would dive deeper into the psyche; like confronting the aftershocks following a significant heartbreak, or relearning your emotional baseline as you mature. Subsequent releases, Cold Nights (2017), his acclaimed debut Will You Think of Me Later? (2019), and its follow up Staring at Ceilings (2021), reveal an artist devoted to sharpening his ability to translate his experiences into ubiquitous statements, and saw him open for Hollow Coves, JP Saxe, Noah Kahan. 

Subscribe to Edwin Raphael’s Newsletter HERE.

BUY / STREAM STARING AT CEILINGS EP HERE

WATCH EDWIN RAPHAEL PERFORM LIVE ON CBC MUSIC’S ‘THE INTRO’ HERE

MORE PRAISE FOR STARING AT CEILINGS

“'Sea of Things' feels primal, mimicking the ocean with cyclical, crashing movements, patiently building itself up and washing itself back out." - FLAUNT

"Calming ambience and angelic vocals." - Lyrical Lemonade

"Chill pop with a touch of folk." - EARMILK

"Weightless and ethereal" - Indie Shuffle

"The instrumental and harmonic components provide the same floating-in-space feeling we love from Fleet Foxes." - Culture Collide

"Offers an escape from anxiety." - Kajal

"Incredibly raw and emotional." - C-Heads 

"A gently addictive soundscape, all wistful energy and patient." - Beats Per Minute

"Notes of Bon Iver and Frank Ocean come to a glorious head to create something moving, exciting and fresh." - The Rodeo

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LOUIE SHORT SHARES NEW DELUXE SINGLE FEATURING “WHAT CAN I DO” 1979 ORIGINAL RECORDING

NEW DELUXE SINGLE FEATURING LOUIE SHORT’S “WHAT CAN I DO”, ORIGINALLY WRITTEN BY HIS FATHER IN THE 70s, AND THE ORIGINAL 1979 RECORDING

LISTEN / SHARE “WHAT CAN I DO” HERE
BUY / STREAM “WHAT CAN I DO” HERE

LISTEN / SHARE “WHAT CAN I DO” (ORIGINAL 1979 DEMO VERSION)
BUY / STREAM “WHAT CAN I DO” (ORIGINAL 1979 DEMO VERSION)

Photo Credit : Pics by Vic  // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

In the Fall of 2021, Louie Short released his sophomore album, Omw 4ev, on 444%. Louie was the sole architect of the project, showcasing his DIY instincts from songwriting through mix. The record conjures elements that range from Tobias Jessso Jr. to Gram Parsons. Warmth, charm and honesty. 

The album’s opener and first single, a beautiful song called “What Can I Do”, is a song with a journey interesting enough to warrant a standalone release and connects a father and son’s career almost 40 years apart. The song was written by Louie’s father Michael Short and an artist named BJ Cook in late 70s Toronto. It was recorded with the intent of selling it - possibly through BJ’s ex-husband David Foster - but nothing came and the tape disappeared. 40 years later, in the process of clearing out the old studio, an engineer who had always liked the recording digitized and emailed it to the writers. His dad played it for him and Louie cut the record shortly thereafter.

Now we’re blessed to be releasing the original 1979 demo recording, the duet between Cook and Louie’s father. It’s a much different song, recorded through the lens of a very different time, but the interpretations a generation apart are both more than worth their time.

Michael Short had this to say: "I love what Louie did to it. It's amazing that he's kept this song alive after all these years." 

Louie had some comments around the record that fit here: “Things in the middle of life tend to be neglected,” he said. “I think that this forgotten middle space is exciting and uncharted. It holds a certain poignancy because it doesn’t have the manipulative magnetism of creation and destruction, birth and death, to grab your attention. It just has itself existing.”

LISTEN / SHARE “WHAT CAN I DO” HERE
BUY / STREAM “WHAT CAN I DO” HERE

LISTEN / SHARE “WHAT CAN I DO” (ORIGINAL 1979 DEMO VERSION)
BUY / STREAM “WHAT CAN I DO” (ORIGINAL 1979 DEMO VERSION)

“What Can I Do” Deluxe Single Artwork // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

MORE ABOUT Omw 4ev
“The genre is songs,” is a direct quote from Louie Short. It does well to represent both his approach and his sense of humor. After all this is an artist whose previous bio stated: “He’s not not trying to be Carole King.” The point is, Louie’s a songwriter, and a real good one. He established that much with the release of 2019’s Cherry, Cherry.

His latest record, Omw 4ev, is about “real love that you work for,” Louie says. “We call a lot of songs love songs, but often they aren’t really love songs; they're infatuation songs. 

They feature love that is obsessively beginning or tragically ending while claiming foreverness, but beginnings and endings don't last forever. Forever is in the middle of things. In those parts of life and love where you are just participating in a process. So in a world where you’re either coming or going, I wanted to celebrate the part where you are on your way… forever!”

BUY / STREAM Omw 4ev HERE

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