Since Widowspeak came on the scene five years ago, the band has seen many permanent changes: new lineups, new environments.  Instead of bringing additional permanent members into the fold after the departure of its founding drummer, the band was whittled down to a duo, a lineup which has remained constant since 2012.  After releasing a second LP, Almanac, and The Swamps EP (both in 2013), Molly and Rob left Brooklyn for the (quite literally) greener pastures of the Catskills/Hudson Valley region.  They found a house they could play music in. They got a dog.

And they took their damn time making All Yours. For one, the conceptual process of writing  Almanac and The Swamps had been creatively draining.  They focused on other things: Molly went back to school, Rob took a job at a Catskills hotel. They wrote leisurely, from shared voice memos and late night jams in the living room.  As a result of writing down what came naturally, without any overarching vision, the lyrics on All Yours are largely unadorned, the songs connected only by the forgivingly vague theme of “moving on”.

Appropriately, the band chose to work again with Jarvis Taveniere, who produced their self-titled debut in 2011.  They also enlisted him and drummer Aaron Neveu (both of whom play in Woods) as the studio rhythm section.  The presence of Taveniere and Neveu contributes a groove that wasn’t there previously, and there’s a few other new things: the swell of strings at critical moments, and for the first time, voices beyond Molly’s own.  We finally get to hear Rob sing in the earnestly laid-back “Borrowed World.”  Members of psych outfit Quilt contribute harmonies and keys throughout the record, most notably in “My Baby’s Gonna Carry On”, and “Cosmically Aligned”.

Perhaps All Yours is so refreshing because it’s a return to form.  It’s a record that feels as effortlessly unplanned as their debut, that serves to capture a moment rather than create one. Order All Yours now and don’t miss the band as they tour the U.S. this fall.

Tour Dates

10/02 – San Francisco, CA – Culture Collide Festival @ Swedish American Hall
10/09 – Boston, MA – Unitarian Universalist Church
10/10 – Kingston, NY – O+ Positive Festival
10/11 – Toronto, ON – Silver Dollar
10/12 – Ann Arbor, MI – Bling Pig
10/13 – Chicago, IL – Chop Shop
10/14  – St. Louis, MO – Luminary Arts
10/15 – Norman, OK – Opolis
10/16 – Dallas, TX – Foundry
10/17 – Austin, TX – Lamberts
10/18 – New Orleans, LA –  Gasa Gasa
10/19 – Atlanta, GA – Drunken Unicorn
10/20 – Asheville, NC – Mothlight
10/21 – Chapel Hill, NC – Cat’s Cradle
10/22 – Washington, DC – Comet Ping Pong