The rumors are true! Drag City has confirmed that Simple Songs is indeed a new Jim O’Rourke album, his first proper solo release since 2009 and first “pop” one since 2001’s Insignificance. It’s not the orchestral pop album we had hypothesized earlier, but it sounds like it’s going to be a good one (not that we’d expect anything different from O’Rourke). From Drag City:
Yes, Simple Songs is an album of songs sung by Jim O’Rourke all the way through! It has been ten years since Jim’s voice rang out from a new album. What Simple Songs sounds like…. At this point, the range of sounds and songs that have turned Jim’s head are numerous enough to have crushed together into something that is unmistakably his-the vast, glossy and glittering O’Rourkian (yes, like Kervorkian) wall of sound. The music’s got OCD quality, played so immaculately by so many instruments, and most of them by the creator’s hand. This time’s really the widest screen yet for Jim’s popular song-style, truly breathtaking! Simple Songs was worked over, from source material to finished mix, for five years or more now. Jim’s writing is kinda rooted in the approach of Insignificance-frosted pop tarts that leave a darkly bitter aftertaste.
Shit, nice writing. Guess we don’t have to review it now!
Anyway, Simple Songs is out May 19 on Drag City. Peep the tracklisting and another preview from the album below.
Simple Songs tracklist:
01. Friends With Benefits
02. That Weekend
03. Half Life Crisis
04. Hotel Blue
05. These Hands
06. Last Year
07. End Of The Road
08. All Your Love
• Jim O’Rourke: http://steamroom.bandcamp.com
• Drag City: http://www.dragcity.com