"Together Apart" was written the day I canceled March tour. On the cusp of social distancing, I started thinking about my own search for purpose and connection, making a list of some treasured unscripted moments, memories joyful and bittersweet, and those I spent them with.
Brilliant friends in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Wisconsin lent their talents through homebound sessions and emailed files, a beautiful sense of collectivity in the face of isolation. A heartfelt thanks to Chris Bloniarz, Evan Kaspar, Holly McGarry, and Max Somerville for instrumentation, Thomas Wincek for mixing, and Justin Perkins at Mystery Room for making it sound so sweet.
In this uncertain time, I have never been more grateful for—or in awe of—community. Large-scale crises can cast into starker relief the ways in which we are interconnected and how easy it is to forget that. When we make it through this, let’s continue to show up for each other. For now, I’m sending love and light. Hope this brings a little bit of both.
lyrics
We are in this world together, always have been always will
Blue and green, a daydream beaten, brutal, beautiful
And ravages of capital cloaked in decency
Our capacity for love and for belief
Taking one step forward and right back to the start
Scared to be together, afraid to be apart
There are no perfect people, only messy ones in store
Those it’s worth believing in and still worth fighting for
I am flawed and I am foundering but smiling in the sun
Come check out my glass house my glass door
I can show you around my troubled mind and my tired hopeful heart
Scared to be together, afraid to be apart
A cardinal, a sentinel, a memory of you
This red bird on a hydro line, this evening walking through
If I could have an hour just to talk to you again
To say the things I never did, you’re gone
Oh I missed my cues, my monologue, could never nail this part
Scared to be together, afraid to be apart
Well I don’t pray, but every day remember
What a fragile thing this living, oh, it is
See me swimming with my best friend in the Nova Scotia surf
Holding on my newborn nephew’s tiny perfect hand
Laughing with my dad until the tears run down our shirts
Sitting with my grandma at the end
Sometimes it comes easy, other days it’s hard
Scared to be together, afraid to be apart
supported by 8 fans who also own “Together, Apart”
Makes me nostalgic for three things: something I never had. Something I could have shared with someone before he dove off and away. Lastly, something I can have. Future nostalgia. brancedar
Songs of timeless beauty and power in the mold of Vashti Bunyan and Nick Drake from enigmatic Los Angeles artist Shannon Lay. Bandcamp New & Notable Aug 4, 2017