Songwriter, performer, and composer Ethan Gold is rewarding those waiting for a new album of songs with a trilogy of LPs about our alienation and inter-connectedness, Earth City. The first album Earth City 1: The Longing arrives May 14th, with two other parts to follow in 2022.
This will be Gold’s first album of songs since Songs From A Toxic Apartment, a debut that earned praise from Pitchfork (“emotions delivered with an unfiltered, glaring legibility”), the Sunday Times London (“Essential New Music”), and throughout the blogosphere.
A reason behind the break between his releases of new songs was a head injury that left Gold living without his ability to communicate, though Gold says “my soul was still very much there.” During his recovery time off-stage, Gold continued composing film scores, for Don’t Let Go (Universal/Blumhouse) and The Song of Sway Lake (featuring John Grant and the Staves singing Ethan’s songs), and also released two albums of oddities, Expanses (Teenage Synthstrumentals) (“My nominee for record of the year” – Vents Magazine) and Live Undead Bedroom Closet Covers (“If this is what he comes up with to pass the time, that second album should be pretty something.” – Roots and Branches). Prior to his debut, Gold had received accolades for producing and arranging Elvis Perkins’ influential Ash Wednesday album.
Earth City 1: The Longing’s first two singles are a pair about two decaying American cities, “Alexandria & Me”/ “In New York,” coming February 25, 2021. “Alexandria & Me” is an anthem about the thrill and terror of chasing the ghosts of pre-gentrification downtown LA, and “In New York” is a snowy and smoky late-night ballad of nostalgia and romance, sung to a vanished lover or a vanishing city.
Listen to 'Alexandria & Me' HERE
Listen to 'In New York' HERE