Milwaukee-based Buffalo Nichols will release his highly-anticipated new album ‘The Fatalist’ on 15th September via Fat Possum. The follow-up to his critically-acclaimed 2021 self-titled debut, ‘The Fatalist’ sounds unlike any blues record you’re likely to hear in 2023. To accompany today’s announcement, Nichols has shared its lead single: a dusky take on Blind Willie Johnson’s original ‘You’re Gonna Need Somebody On Your Bond.’ Directed by Samer Ghani, the video captures songwriter, guitarist, and vocalist Carl Nichols singing of salvation and relief in his soundscape that teems with the joyous claustrophobia of classic gospel. Sampled triggers of Charley Patton’s version connect the earliest blues recordings to the present, both singers’ voices urgent in their message.
Nichols explains: “A traditional song made modern. Which aspects of ‘the Blues’ are essential? Is it a melody? A certain vocabulary? Delivery? Instrumentation? Is this still a blues song? And most importantly: who gets to decide? I tried to reimagine the blues with this song as if it were allowed to grow and progress uninterrupted, uncolonised and ungentrified.”
WATCH ‘YOU’RE GONNA NEED SOMEBODY ON YOUR BOND’ VIDEO HERE
STREAM ‘YOU’RE GONNA NEED SOMEBODY ON YOUR BOND’ HERE
Nichols, who is currently on a summer tour across the U.S, will perform at London’s Rough Trade East shop on 28th August. ‘The Fatalist’ is now available for pre-order HERE.
On his self-produced second album, Nichols does things with the blues that might catch you off guard. There’s 808 programming, chopped up samples, washes of synth. There’s a consideration of the fullness of the sonic stage and the atmospherics of blues music that can only come with a long engagement with electronic music. But this is no gimmicky hybrid or attempt to turn the blues into 21st century music by simply dressing it with skittering hi-hats. Nichols’ vision for the blues is of a form of music that’s intimately tied to everyday life in 2023, something that’s reflected not only in the choice of instrumentation, but in the complexities of the songwriting and the grey areas his lyrics explore. This is music that comes straight from the present, and as such, it’s a reminder that the same shit that drove the first blues singers to pick up a guitar is still present behind the throbs of deep bass hits today.
Of course, Nichols’ songwriting has always been firmly rooted in the present. He proved he could succeed on the music industry’s own blues terms on his self-titled 2021 debut, whose songs, Bandcamp Daily said, “seem to flow from some great repository of emotion and insight.” ‘The Fatalist’ finds him digging deeper in search of answers to ever-more-complicated questions around responsibility and self-definition, his plainspoken lyrics both cutting and refreshing in their sincerity and refusal to accept pat solutions. Still, Nichols rarely sounds like a blues singer. Like Leonard Cohen, he dominates these songs with his voice. His low, guttural baritone is high in the mix, and he sounds coiled, clenched tight. The slow drip of his songwriting lends ‘The Fatalist’ an incredible amount of drama, which the production, at times dark and dewy and claustrophobic, at times zippy with light, further emphasises.
That personal touch is evident in how considerately these songs have been framed. “In a lot of ways I was improvising,” he says, and he leaned on his years of experience as a DIY musician – and the songs themselves – to guide him. “Drum machines are a 50-year-old technology. If the blues hadn’t been hijacked and trapped in amber, I think they naturally would’ve been incorporated.” The drum programming throughout feels like a natural rhythmic vehicle for these songs. “When you pick up a guitar, the first thing you’re gonna play is the blues,” he says. “And when you pick up an 808, you’re gonna start doing trap beats.”
The stakes throughout this album are largely personal, rather than social; Nichols is singing about his life in the first person and about his desire to forge his own individuality in a world and a music industry that make it nearly impossible to do so. Ringing through ‘The Fatalist Blues, and ‘The Fatalist,’ is a simple question: Do I have any say in how things are going to go? It’s the question behind so much of the physical and psychic pain in the blues, and in a frustrating age that preaches self-empowerment and shames the disenfranchised, it’s a stridently modern question, too. By playing his music the way he wants to play it, by refusing to give up his creative control or accept anyone else’s definition of the blues or indeed his own life, Nichols has tried to forge an answer. Does he have any say in how things are going to go? Let’s find out.
‘The Fatalist’ LP tracklist:
1. Cold Black Stare
2. You’re Gonna Need Somebody On Your Bond
3. Love Is All
4. Turn Another Stone
5. The Difference
6. The Long Journey Home
7. The Fatalist Blues
8. This Moment (feat. Samantha Rise)
Buffalo Nichols tour dates
06/09 – Flagstaff, AZ – Flagstaff Blues Fest
06/10 – Tucson, AZ – Club Congress
06/11 – Phoenix, AZ – Rebel Lounge
06/15 – Philadelphia, PA – Milkboy
06/16 – Philadelphia, PA – WXPN Free at Noon
06/16 – Monkton, MD – The Loft at Manor Mill
06/17 – Bowie, MD – Juneteenth Jubilee
06/17 – Columbia, MD – Columbia Fest for the Arts
06/18 – Berryville, VA – Barns of Rose Hill
06/19 – Pittsburgh, PA – Club Cafe
06/23 – Des Moines, IA – Des Moines Arts Festival
06/24 – Madison, WI – Memorial Union Terrace at Univ of Wisconsin
06/29 – Hamilton, OH – Riversedge Amphitheater
06/30 – Memphis, TN – Overton Park
07/06-08 – Winnipeg, MB – Winnipeg Folk Fest
07/20 – San Francisco, CA – SF Jazz Summer Fest
07/21-22 – Marquette, MI – Hiawatha Music Festival
07/27-30 – Calgary, AB – Calgary Folk Fest
08/10 – Fort Collins, CO – Bohemian Foundation
08/12 – Cheyenne, WY – Cheyenne Arts Celebration
08/18 – Roxbury, NY – Roxbury ARts Center
08/19 – Portsmouth, NH – The Music Hall – Live Under the Arch Series
08/24-27 – Tønder, DK – Tønder Festival
08/28 – London, UK – Rough Trade East
09/06 – Bloomington, IN – The Bishop
09/07 – Newport, KY – Southgate House
09/08 – Louisville, KY – Zanzabar
09/09 – Bowling Green. OH – Black Swamp Arts Festival
09/14 – Denver, CO – Levitt Pavilion
09/15-17 – Telluride Blues & Brews
09/20 – Elkton, MD – Elkton Music Hall
09/21 – Southampton, PA – Stone Turtle House Concert
09/22 – New York, NY – Mercury Lounge
09/23 – New Haven, CT – Cafe Nine
09/24 – North Adams, MA – Freshgrass
10/05 – Madison, WI – High Noon
10/06 – Chicago, IL – Sleeping Village
10/07 – Minneapolis, MN – Turf Club
10/12 – Grand Rapids, MI – Midtown
10/13 – Cleveland, OH – Beachland Tavern
10/14 – Jackson, MI – Jackson Symphony Orchestra
10/15 – Columbus, OH – Rumba Cafe – WCBE Happy Hour
10/18 – Buffalo, NY – Buffalo Iron Works
10/19 – Rochester, NY – Abilene Bar & Lounge
10/20 – Providence, RI – Askew
10/21 – Portland, ME – One Longfellow
10/22 – Waterbury Center, VT – Zenbarn
11/10 – Milwaukee, WI – Turner Hall
11/13 – Seattle, WA – Sunset Tavern
11/14 – Portland, OR – Mississippi Studios
11/15 – Eugene, OR – Hult Center
11/16 – Grass Valley, CA – Grass Valley Center for the Arts
11/17 – Livermore, CA – Livermore Valley Performing Arts Center
11/18 – Los Angeles, CA – Gold Diggers
11/29 – Charlotte, NC – Snug Harbor
11/30 – Asheville, NC – Grey Eagle
12/01 – Atlanta, GA – The Earl
12/02 – Nashville, TN – Blue Room
12/03 – Memphis, TN – B-Side / Folk All Y’all
12/05 – Little Rock, AR – White Water Tavern
12/06 – Dallas, TX – Sundown at Granada
12/07 – San Antonio, TX – Sam’s Burger Joint
12/08 – Austin, TX – Antone’s
12/09 – Houston, TX – Continental Club
12/15 – Waverly, AL – Standard Deluxe
12/16 – Macon, GA – Society Garden
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