the lead single from the Brooklyn artist’s debut album captures sensations of crystallization and connection—sonic nostalgia for that new-in-NYC feeling
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Much like one remembers all the firsts of a first love, every NYC transplant, be they from Barcelona or Boise, has vivid memories of their early days in this city burned in their buzzing brains and engraved on their hustlin’ little hearts. Elation and liberation, exhilaration and humiliation. The lights, the sights, the sounds, the… smells.
Whatever or whoever it was that inspired you to move here, be it Patti Smith or Lou Reed, Spike Lee or Jay Z, Warhol or Woody Allen
(or Sex and the City or Seinfeld), in making the choice to plant your freak flag on this fertile ground, you’ve demonstrated you’re a certain type of person: definitely dreamer, part masochist, maybe more than a little bit crazy. You’ve got to be nuts to live here. You’ve got to be Nuts 4 Nuts.
I have a few hypotheses for why there are so many songs about New York. It could be that it’s a particularly inspiring city in its highs and its lows — the same kind of rollercoaster relationship that inspires actual love songs. Maybe it attracts the type of people (creatives) that are spiritually driven to write songs. Or perhaps it’s the fact that we’ve all got to romanticize this place because the rent is so damn high. (Most likely, a combination of all three.) But whatever the reason, New York songs are my favorite songs — ones by people in this hub, for the people in this club. Because beyond having our own NYC experiences, what’s more enjoyable than to bear witness to others’?
On that note, I’m thrilled to introduce the latest song added to what is by far my favorite kind of canon. A sonic scrapbook from an artist who moved to the city 15 years ago to (forgive the clichés, but when it comes to this city, they really do apply) follow her dreams and find herself.
This is “City of Stone” — the new single from Emily Jeanne Brown, out everywhere TODAY!
In the city of stone / It feels like home /When you’re on your own / But you’re not alone
“City of Stone” is the lead single from Coaster, the West-turned-East-Coast artist’s debut album, dropping later this summer.
Snow on the train tracks and rain on the concrete, midnight secrets and hidden gardens… for this song—a slow-burning banger—Emily shares freeze frames straight from the soul, a series of sensory polaroids taken while beginning to build her life in the city.
Of the track, Emily says:
“I have such vivid sense memories of being in New York City on my own for the first time; I felt completely uprooted and out of my depth, and at the same time like the world was my oyster. It comes back to me in flashes: stumbling upon a magical garden on the Lower East Side on a steamy summer night, feeling the screech of the subway cars in my teeth, watching the sun glow off the palisades from my Washington Heights apartment. This song is about those moments in my early twenties when it felt possible to crystallize time, to be completely absorbed in my own experience while also feeling deeply connected to everything and everyone around me.”
While the song may revolve around a new life in a very modern city, the sonic elements took some more ancient inspiration.
“We built a lot of this record around really bright doubled acoustic guitars,” Emily says. “Somewhere along the way, Deidre and I got inspired by pursuing a ‘medieval’ vibe, which resulted in lute-like 12-string lines, mystical chimes and a mellotron flute to create an epic, otherworldly feeling on the bridge.”
Best listened to, perhaps, on the Brooklyn bridge?
You can celebrate the new single in the very studio where it was recorded with a private listening session on May 15th!
And come out to make some new New York memories at the Coaster release party, July 10th at C’mon Everybody.
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Follow the band at @emilyjeannebrown and add the songs to your Spotify playlists now!
Feature image (provided by the artist): Meg Urbani
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