Searows detail forthcoming album, Death in the Business of Whaling

2 weeks ago 10

“Dearly Missed is my contribution to the so-called “good for her” horror genre. I’m an avid horror lover for many reasons, but I appreciate it in particular for the ability of the genre to explore societal issues without reading as too preachy. The reality of this world for marginalized people gets bleaker by the day and watching someone on screen who you can relate to fighting back and winning and taking back their dignity can be an extremely cathartic and empowering experience.

I wrote this song for the part of me that desires retribution for all the ways I and every marginalized person has been harmed and betrayed by society. I had a lot of fun writing this song and exploring a musical genre that I don’t often write in, but enjoy listening to and I’m really looking forward to performing it live,” Searows explains.

Though Death in the Business of Whaling arrives as Searows’ second album, it’s the product of many firsts, including his first time recording outside the creative cocoon of his bedroom. His 2022 debut Guard Dog was written, recorded and self-produced in Duckart’s Portland home and independently released with little expectation as to how it would be received.

“I had really wonderfully connective and intimate experiences sharing my first couple of projects with live audiences. Those projects were very personal and vulnerable and revealing my life and specific experiences to an audience began to feel a bit dissonant and exposing,” he explains. “One of my favourite things about music is its ability to connect people. It has done so for me time and time again and it has been so special to see my own writing do that for people too. I just began to learn that for myself, there were specifics that I wanted to keep for myself.”

As a result, Duckart became interested in writing songs that read more like folklore. The songs became a vessel for digging deep and exploring his life and point of view, but in a way that spoke outwardly more symbolically than literally. “Something your subconscious understands before your conscious mind does. Visceral rather than literal. And that relationship to our deeper selves, our subconscious, our souls, is a major theme of the album for me. Most of these songs are about the different ways we all bump up against the human condition. Our spirit, the shadow self, our egos, trauma, love and fate. How we cope with our experiences and how we connect and take care of one another in an exceedingly dark and violent world. This record is still deeply personal to me. But it is an attempt to reveal my cards in a more coded, symbolic manner.”

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