If you went to a lot of warehouse shows in the early '00s, you were probably familiar with Carissa's Wierd, a band who made music way too beautiful for their surroundings. Back then, it was totally normal to walk into a punk-house basement and hear soul-transporting folk-rock harmonies. Now, in retrospect, Carissa's Wierd feels more like a strange little miracle, so it's great to see that they're about to return with their first new album in a quarter-century.
Jenn Champion and Mat Brookes started Carissa's Wierd in Tucson in the mid-'90s, then relocated to Seattle after touring with Modest Mouse. They developed a gorgeously considered slowcore sound and added a couple of new members, including teenage drummer Ben Bridwell. Carissa's Wierd released three albums and then broke up in 2003. Jenn Champion went on to form the duo S and then to release a series of underrated solo records. Brookes and Bridwell started Band Of Horses, and then Brookes left that band and formed Grand Archives.
Carissa's Wierd reissued their catalog and played a reunion show in 2010, and they released the one-off single "Tucson" a year later. They've been playing shows again recently, and now they've announced Somewhere Further Than Far Away, which comes out early next year and which will be their first LP since 2002's Songs About Leaving. Brookes and Champion recorded the album by doing their own parts in their bedrooms, sending the pieces back and forth, before finishing it at a Seattle studio.
Album opener "No One Lives Here Anymore" is the first new Carissa's Wierd song in 15 years, and it sounds like it was beamed in directly from the distant past. Harmonies swirl around each other delicately before the drums come in. It's gorgeous. Below, check out the studio version of "No One Lives Here Anymore," as well as a live video and the tracklist for Somewhere Further Than Far Away.
TRACKLIST:
01 "No One Lives Here Anymore"
02 "Painted Hell"
03 "There’s Nowhere To Go"
04 "Necklaces Exploding"
05 "January"
06 "What Has Been Done Cannot Be Undone"
07 "Another Ugly Ending"
08 "I Don’t Feel Like I Feel Right"
09 "Just Been Lied To (Part VI)"
10 "Circling The Ashtray / Sleepwalking Off Rooftops"
11 "A Place In The Sun"
12 "Whispering Drunks"
13 "3 Palms (Main Theme)"
Somewhere Further Than Far Away is out 1/8 on Nettwerk. Pre-order it here. Carissa's Wierd and their contempoaries the American Analog Set will headline LA's And Always Forever festival, which goes down 11/6-8 at the Echo and Echoplex.
