BRADEN LAM UNVEILS NEW VIDEO FOR “OBSOLETE”

WATCH / SHARE “OBSOLETE” HERE

BRADEN LAM’S DEBUT LP, THE CLOUDMAKER’S CRY, OUT NOW

SPRING TOUR DATES CONTINUE IN JUNE - TICKETS HERE

BUY / STREAM THE CLOUDMAKER’S CRY HERE

“Welcoming Vancouver-based singer Michaela Slinger onto the track for an old-fashioned duet, the two sing about heartbreak and reconciliation while pushing through the toughest of times and coming out strong on the other end.The two soft-spoken vocalists prove to be a great match for each other, blending their tones together as they tentatively venture requests to start taking the slow steps to fully opening back up emotionally.” RANGE on “Wide Open”

“Wide Open" has a classic country feel reinforced by haunting pedal steel and the harmony singing of Vancouver’s Michaela Slinger, who co-wrote the tune with Lam in Nashville. Lyrically it digs deep, probing a challenging time in a relationship and the warm and poignant vocals of Lam deliver the message skillfully.” Billboard on “Wide Open”

"Braden Lam's inviting voice rings out over gentle guitar and vibraphone on ‘Beautiful Neighbourhoods’, a timeless single that vibrates with warmth and longing." - CBC MUSIC

"Crafts an expansive but intimate sonic world for us to lose ourselves in" - Earmilk

"Calling to mind the happiest takes by Ben Howard or Tim Baker" - The Coast Halifax

“Obsolete” Video Still 

Following the release of Braden Lam’s debut album, The Cloudmaker’s Cry, today the celebrated songwriter is sharing the new video for “Obsolete”, a song “inspired by the beautiful port town of Lunenburg on the South shore of Nova Scotia,” says Lam. “Historically known for its fishing and ship-building related industries, most notably the birthplace of The Bluenose ship. I spent a summer's week there participating in a songcamp facilitated by the Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival and meandering the streets got me thinking about all the different lives, dreams, and trades that those old shops had probably seen. Generations of expertise in various niches mostly gone obsolete by the turn of the 21st century. Co-writer Erin Turcke and I landed on this story of a rubber stamp maker who is witnessing this change firsthand. The technology gets brighter, money gets tighter, and the heart grows lighter as they realize they need to move on. We couldn't film this music video in the middle of a January winter so an abandoned gold mining town in Arizona is the second best thing to Lunenburg!”

WATCH / SHARE “OBSOLETE” HERE

MORE ABOUT THE CLOUDMAKER’S CRY
The Cloudmaker’s Cry is Lam’s debut full-length album, and he means album in the classic sense: 10 considered and thoughtful folk songs, meticulously arranged and painstakingly sequenced, meant to be played on a turntable in a single sitting, whiskey optional. Though barely 27, he has lived the life of a much older man—with years of touring, entrepreneurship, and marriage already accounted for—and this collection of songs reflects lessons learned earlier than most, about time and love and the world.

WATCH / SHARE “THE HOLD” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “COWBOY BOOTS” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “BEAUTIFUL NEIGHBOURHOODS” (MUSIC VIDEO) HERE

It was produced in Toronto by Eli Browning, a new approach for Lam, who made his previous three EPs with a host of producers across Atlantic Canada. The pair’s touchstones as they worked through a city springtime in a converted church studio were George Harrison, Neil Young, and other sounds from the 1960s and 70s: music that is lyric-forward and performed with folk instrumentation in analogue tones, resulting in a timeless singer-songwriter record.

This vibe carries through the entire package, from the tintype photographs of Lam to the images wrought in 35mm in the liner notes, to his charming video collaborations with Griffin O’Toole that combine nostalgia, surrealism, and camp into a distinct style of film. Each particular piece fits perfectly into the primary vision, creating something grand in its authenticity and comforting in its warmth.

The album features singles, “Beautiful Neighbourhoods”, which climbed to #7 on the CBC Music Top 20, “Highway Jesus”, “Hurricane Season”, and “Wide Open”, a duet with Vancouver’s Michaela Slinger. Lam was also named as one of 8 semi-finalists in SiriusXM’s 2025 ‘Top of the Country’. 

WATCH / SHARE “WIDE OPEN” FT. MICHAELA SLINGER HERE
WATCH / SHARE “HURRICANE SEASON” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “HIGHWAY JESUS” (MUSIC VIDEO) HERE

TOUR DATES
May 30, Toronto ON, The Cameron House
June 12, St. Catharines, ON - Warehouse Concert Hall
June 13, Waterloo ON, Emmanuel United Church
June 14, Uxbridge ON, Springtide Fest

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GREAT LAKE SWIMMERS RETURN WITH “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN”, ANNOUNCE CANADIAN TOUR DATES

GREAT LAKE SWIMMERS REVEAL FIRST NEW SINGLE SINCE UNCERTAIN COUNTRY (2023), “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN”

WATCH / SHARE “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN” HERE
BUY / STREAM “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN” HERE

CANADIAN TOUR DATES WITH ELLIOTT BROOD COMMENCE OCTOBER 15 | TICKETS HERE

Photo Credit : Robert Georgeff // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

What would a Great Lake Swimmers song sound like if it were written during a hazy Laurel Canyon summer in the late 1960s? “One More Dance Around The Sun” offers a compelling answer. Their first new music since 2023’s Uncertain Country, it’s a warm, reflective track that rolls forward like a long drive at golden hour — steady, hopeful, and grounded in the quiet momentum of everyday life.

Led by songwriter Tony Dekker, Great Lake Swimmers have spent the past twenty-odd years crafting music that feels at once deeply rooted and free-floating — tethered to land and language, yet always reaching for something beyond. On this track, Dekker turns his eye to the passage of time and the search for constancy in an ever-shifting world. Lyrically grounded in furrows and rows, rivers and roads, the song traces the cyclical nature of days and seasons, of work and wear, and the idea that maybe, in the repetition, there’s a deeper insight to be attained. And a hope that digging through the dust might just uncover some kind of light.

WATCH / SHARE “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN” HERE
BUY / STREAM “ONE MORE DANCE AROUND THE SUN” HERE

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“This song pinpoints a very distinct feeling for me,” says Dekker. “Riding around in the summertime with the windows down — maybe after a solid workday, maybe on route to an epic road trip, or maybe just seeing familiar surroundings with renewed vision. It’s about perseverance, new beginnings, and the searching that invites wisdom and perspective as the planet spins on.”

Recorded at Ganaraska Recording Company, a converted century-old farmhouse near Port Hope, Ontario, “One More Dance Around The Sun” brings together a trusted ensemble of Canadian folk collaborators. Dekker’s hushed, clear voice sits at the center of a warmly textured arrangement shaped by producer and bassist Darcy Yates and engineer and pedal steel guitarist Jimmy Bowskill. Colleen Brown’s Joni Mitchell–esque backing vocals lend harmonies that are both airy and soulful. The result is a golden-hued, analog-soaked track that feels lived-in, effortless, and casually luminous — a song that seems to have been with you all along, even on first listen.

Great Lake Swimmers to take to the road for Canadian tour dates with Elliot BROOD this fall beginning October 15. 

GREAT LAKE SWIMMERS ON TOUR
October 15   Regina, SK  Darke Hall
October 17  Sherwood Park, AB  Festival Place Theatre
October 18  St. Albert, AB   Arden Theatre
October 20   Red Deer, AB   Bo's Bar & Grill 
October 21  Vernon, BC  The Vernon Towne Theatre 
October 23  Vancouver, BC  Biltmore Cabaret 
October 24  Victoria, BC  Capital Ballroom 
October 25  Nanaimo, BC  The Queens 
October 26   Campbell River, BC  Tidemark Theatre
October 28  Golden, BC  Golden Civic Centre 
October 29  Revelstoke, BC  Revelstoke Performing Arts Centre
October 30   Calgary, AB  Commonwealth Bar & Stage 
November 1  Saskatoon, SK  The Capitol Music Club
November 2 Winnipeg, MB  Park Theatre
All dates with Elliott BROOD

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DAN MANGAN SHARES LIVE PERFORMANCE VIDEO NEW ALBUM, NATURAL LIGHT, OUT TOMORROW

WATCH / SHARE “IT MIGHT BE RAINING” (LIVE PERFORMANCE VIDEO) HERE

NATURAL LIGHT ALBUM OUT MAY 16 VIA ARTS & CRAFTS

PRE-ORDER & PRE-SAVE NATURAL LIGHT HERE

SUBSCRIBE TO DAN MANGAN’S SUBSTACK - REALITY SHIELD

FALL CANADIAN TOUR ON SALE NOW
FULL TOUR DATES LISTED BELOW

“Natural Light is a beautiful, subtly layered album—each song worked over just enough, never overwrought. It’s the kind of record made for evening walks in late-summer sun, full of gentle introspection and quiet, difficult questions. Mangan invites listeners into those conversations, even as the world feels like it’s unraveling.” RANGE 

Photo Credit : Zachary Vague // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Tomorrow, Dan Mangan releases Natural Light marking his return to folk music’s classic underpinnings of political resistance and songs founded on building connection. No longer the hopeful young upstart or a stubborn folk-punk, Mangan’s familiar voice emerges to articulate our troubled times with tenderness and humour. Love songs about a planet on the brink of collapse. Campfire songs for a world on fire.

Today, he shares the live performance video of “It Might Be Raining”, the song which opens Mangan’s stunning 7th album, Natural Light. “It Might Be Raining” is a heartfelt reckoning with the world our children will inherit – building from its stark folk essence to irrepressible heights, it brims with Mangan's lyrical compassion and sonic intuition. In his words: ‘You've got a right to be mad / What kind of world have you been handed?’ 

“As my kids approach their teen years, I think about my own adolescence, bussing around rainy Vancouver, lost in OK Computer,” says Mangan. “This song is for them, for what they discover in the big, beautiful, gruesome world, and who they become. If it helps, I want them to know that they don’t need to do anything to earn my love - they just have it.”

WATCH / SHARE “IT MIGHT BE RAINING” (LIVE PERFORMANCE VIDEO) HERE

MORE ABOUT NATURAL LIGHT
Before a single note of Dan Mangan’s Natural Light was recorded he listened through a series of song demos and sincerely considered the title Schminger Schmongwriter. After years of rolling his eyes at the genre, there is poetry in accepting that the two best words to describe him may in fact be “singer” and “songwriter”.

In context, the nod to Harry Nilsson’s landmark album Nilsson Schmilsson is not out of place. There’s a feeling of timelessness to Natural Light in the curiosity, the wit, and the playfulness in Dan’s voice, through his words, and the vibrancy of the music. The analog patina and subtle reminders that this tender, funny and devastating work was made by humans together in a room. Mangan’s newest offering bears the the poise of a modern classic, seeded by Dan’s singular lyricism and forged unexpectedly by four best buds over six days in a cabin in the woods.

WATCH / SHARE “CUT THE BRAKES” HERE
BUY / STREAM “CUT THE BRAKES” HERE

There is something fitting in Mangan hitting this high watermark at this stage of his life. You can trace the chapters of his story in the fabric of Natural Light. You’ll find remnants of the tenacious young artist who booked tours of Europe via Myspace in the mid 2000s. The emergent songwriter who hibernated into fatherhood just as arena-folk exploded in the early 2010s. The genre-bender who has subtly challenged his audience with each album, tracing a unique trajectory of confronting and eclipsing his own art. Over two decades, Mangan has managed an enviably strong creative ethic, and his integrity as both a singer and songwriter has only strengthened with age. The big picture cohesiveness of Natural Light harkens to a pre-streaming, album-focused sensibility. Songs bleed together through focused transitions and overlapping interludes. Mangan’s lyrics act as gondolier for the journey, reassuring the listener that it’s cool to care. Dan sings for his kids, for his wife, and for a society in existential crisis. 

Following several studio-centric albums with esteemed producer Drew Brown (Radiohead, Beck), Dan secluded himself deep in the woods of southern Ontario for a week with long-time bandmates Jason Haberman, Mike O’Brien and Don Kerr. They had intended to workshop existing songs, maybe write some new ones, and generally impose zero pressure to accomplish much at all. They pooled recording gear and turned Haberman’s rustic cottage (coined SOUVENIR) into a makeshift studio.

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

“This entire album feels like one big happy accident. A gift from the ether,” says Mangan from his home in Vancouver. “Even if it was never to be released, I can’t fully articulate how grateful I am to have had such a cosmic and charged creative experience with these three people I love so dearly. We were completely locked in. I get choked up just thinking about it.”

The evening they arrived, Dan introduced the band to a song he’d written for his sons - a meandering stream of consciousness lamenting how their modern adolescences might pose challenges from which he cannot spare them. Lightning struck and in three quick takes, the framework for the song was complete, and the table had been set. “It Might Be Raining” was the first song recorded, is the first song on Natural Light, and was the catalyst for six days of jubilant creative frenzy. Between lake jumps and egg scrambles, the crew brought to life 13 songs, many of which had been stewing in Dan’s head for years.

Though these songs were written over the last half-decade, the timing of Natural Light feels urgent. The power and the beauty of this music, as well as its sadness, are imbued with the present political and social zeitgeist. If there exists a need for creative voices to cut through the world’s deafening static with eloquence and honesty, this work is an undeniable candidate.

Dan’s voice and songs have the power to unite and silence a concert hall. A centrepiece of his lyrical prowess is “Soapbox”, a Guthrie-esq rip into “the lie” of modern society. Though he considers it his preachiest song, Mangan’s determined stanzas unfold like a close friend helping to untangle the complexities of our collective struggle. “I hate that, so often, the thing that is most infuriating about society is also the hardest to explain,” he says.

WATCH / SHARE “DIMINISHING RETURNS” HERE
BUY / STREAM “DIMINISHING RETURNS” HERE

The band’s contributions are paramount to Natural Light’s charm and vitality, effortlessly elevating Mangan’s offerings without ever getting in the way. The recordings capture the foursome’s brotherly intuitions, as each note feels responsive, spontaneous, and serendipitous. Jason, Mike and Don buoyantly propel Dan’s melancholic lyrics with assurance and whimsy - a glorious juxtaposition perhaps best demonstrated by Natural Light’s first single “Melody”. Clarinets and slide guitars dance like drunken fools to his elegy about unrequited love.

All four musicians are credited as producers on the album. While O’Brien did the heavy lifting on lead guitar and Kerr on drums, the whole cast shuffled between instruments frequently as the recordings took shape. Minimal time was given to working out “parts”, and they allowed first impulses to direct the process, tracking the songs together “live off the floor”. Back in their respective cities and studios, the foursome continued to hone the recordings over the following months, adding subtle overdubs such as horns, strings and woodwinds.

What cannot be understated here is the creative input from bassist Jason Haberman, who engineered the recordings and even took the photos adorning the LP’s front and back covers. Jason also mixed the album from his Toronto studio. Though several other renowned engineers were initially considered, every step of the process had been intimately tied to the quartet's experience at the cabin, and it felt important to keep the project in the family, so to speak.

Natural Light is a natural resolution for Mangan as a scene-survivor. Dan has emerged as a politically-conscious family man with the maturity and wherewithal to articulate our troubled times with tenderness, intelligence and humour. There is luck involved too - this perfect storm of creativity was not so much conjured as ridden like a wave by four friends with a century of collective experience making records.

Mangan has often described songwriting as a way to articulate his anxieties and unburden his mind. This particular collection of recordings explores the darkness of our time, but embraces the listener like a weighted blanket. Sewn into the fabric, in a secret language, are the words instructions for survival. Dan reminds us that the pain of living frees us. That there are those who leave a light on in case another needs to see. That the feeling will go on. That we should seek the natural light, and when we find it, bask in it like a cat.

MORE ABOUT DAN MANGAN
Dan Mangan is a two time JUNO Award-winning and three time Polaris Music Prize-nominated musician and songwriter. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with his wife and two sons. For decades, Dan has brought signature wit, sonic innovation and lyrical insight to the indie/folk community, garnering him a fiercely dedicated and deeply involved audience. He has played Glastonbury and Jimmy Kimmel Live, sold out Massey Hall and scored acclaimed soundtracks for television and feature film. In 2017, he co-founded Side Door, a community marketplace platform for the arts that seeks to democratize and decentralize the entertainment industry by connecting artists with alternative venue spaces.

PRE-ORDER & PRE-SAVE NATURAL LIGHT HERE

TOUR DATES  
June 27 - St. John’s NL - Iceberg Alley
Sept 25 - Calgary, AB - MacEwan Hall
Sept 26 - Edmonton, AB - Winspear Centre
Sept 29 - Lake Country, BC - Creekside Theatre
Oct 1 - Victoria, BC - Royal Theatre
Oct 3 - Vancouver, BC - Vogue Theatre
Oct 10 - Toronto, ON - Danforth Music Hall
Oct 11 - Ottawa, ON - The Bronson
Nov 25 - Antwerp, BE - Rock Lobster
Nov 26 - Utrecht NL - Ekko
Nov 27 - Hamburg, DE - Nachtasyl
Nov 28 - Berlin, DE - Silent Green
Dec 02 - London, UK - Moth Club
Dec 03 - Leeds, UK - Attic
Jan 23 - Halifax, NS - The Marquee

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NATURAL LIGHT TRACKLIST
01 It Might Be Raining
02 Diminishing Returns
03 I Hated Love Songs
04 Contained Free (Interlude)
05 No Such Thing As Wasted Love
06 Melody
07 My Dreams Are Getting Weirder
08 Soapbox
09 Cut The Brakes
10 For Him
11 Sound The Alarm
12 Proximity
13 Hit The Wall

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