New White Hinterland - "Dreaming Of The Plum Trees"
22-year old vocalist/pianist/etc. Casey Dienel records as White Hinterland. We received Phylactery Factory, her follow-up to 2006's Wind-Up Canary over the weekend, and have been playing quite a bit ever since. Her stuff's wordy, chirpy, and jazzed-out. Her bookishness is fun -- the name of the first song on Phylactery Factory (maybe a "Piss Factory" nod, or she's just making amulets) is called "Destruction Of The Art Deco House" and she also sings about Napoleon, metal birds (on one of our favorites "Lindberghs + Metal Birds"), Calliope (for one of her bigger Joni Mitchell turns), and small town homecomings with all their streamers. Musically we thought about Jolie Holland at first, and she can trill her scenery-setting words like a Newsom, but this is heavier somehow -- and not just because of the roaring psych guitar line on "Dreaming Of The Plum Trees," which you'll find below.
White Hinterland - "Dreaming Of The Plum Trees" (MP3)
"I fell in love again tonight / my heart bled red as dye / through the floor boards." Maybe it's that sorta Marissa Nadler darkness we're feeling when we talk heavy. (Or, hey, maybe it's the cartoon hyenas ripping apart the cartoon zebra on the album cover.) Whatever the case, we'll keep listening.
Phylactery Factory is out 3/4 on Dead Oceans.
[Photo by Tod Seelie]
Posted at 11:21 AM in MP3
Tags: White Hinterland
Awesome, I've been waiting to see her on here since her first album. Awesome that you guys have caught on.
Posted by: Cole at January 18, 2008 11:57 AM | ReplyScore = 0
Let it be known that the "psych guitar line" is played by Adam Selzer, who produced and engineered this album at his studio in Portland, Type Foundry, and who plays guitar and bass for M. Ward and fronts Norfolk & Western.
Posted by: PDXer at January 18, 2008 1:09 PM | ReplyScore = 0
i am loving this song. the artwork is brilliant, too--it's a beautiful cover. their website credits Shawn Creeden.
Posted by: anonymous at January 18, 2008 1:33 PM | ReplyScore = 0
It's impossible to send her a friend request on her MySpace. It's also impossible to send her a message telling her you can't send a friend request. She really needs to change her settings.
Also, she stole our band name. Sort of.
Posted by: Hinterland at January 18, 2008 1:51 PM | ReplyScore = 0
.. . all you have to do is find a friend that you *can* send a message / friend request to - THEN - exchange that friends user id with Casey's [ -or - 5570571].
Posted by: k at January 18, 2008 2:32 PM | ReplyScore = 0
@ hinterland
i've sent messages to her in the past--it seemed to go through as she's responded to them. myspace is f*cked anyways from all of the spam. write to Tom.
Posted by: anonymous at January 18, 2008 2:33 PM | ReplyScore = 0
at first i thought this was the charlie brown peanuts song.
Posted by: erik at January 18, 2008 2:42 PM | ReplyScore = 0
I really do love Casey Dienel, and this is promising and exciting. love.
Posted by: Laura at January 18, 2008 5:07 PM | ReplyScore = 0
This is terrible. And she needs to tune her piano.
Posted by: anonymous at January 19, 2008 11:04 AM | ReplyScore = 0
I thought it sounded a little like the charlie brown piano song as well, but still loved it. Its fun and light and airy and word.
Posted by: marcia at January 25, 2008 9:57 AM | ReplyScore = 0