Mary Chapin Carpenter will release her new album The Dark and the Stars on 7th August 2020 through Lambent Light Records via Thirty Tigers.
The album is produced by Ethan Johns (Ray LaMontagne, Paul McCartney) and was recorded at Peter Gabriel’s Resl World Studios in Bath. Take a listen to the title track below:
The album finds the singer-songwriter pondering life’s intimate, personal moments and exploring its most universally challenging questions at an unprecedented time. It was written at her rural Virginia farmhouse before lockdown and the songs celebrate invaluable experiences and irreplaceable wisdom, while also advocating exploration of the best in all of us.
Of the music, Carpenter shares, “The writer Margaret Renkl once said, ‘We are all in the process of becoming.’ That doesn’t stop at a certain age. To be always a student of art and music and life, as she says, that, to me, is what makes life worth living. It’s certainly what makes me want to still write songs. No sugar coating, the songs are very personal and they’re difficult in some ways, and definitely come from places of pain and self-illumination, but also places of joy, discovery and the rewards of self- knowledge. They arrived from looking outward as much as inward, speaking to life changes, growing older, politics, compassion, #metoo, heartbreak, empathy, the power of memory, time and place. So, I suppose I could say there are many themes, but they all come back to that initial idea that we are all constantly ‘becoming’ through art and expression.”
In celebration of the release, Carpenter will continue her successful “Songs From Home” virtual concert series throughout the summer.
The track list for The Dirt and the Stars is:
1. Farther Along And Further In
2. It’s Ok To Be Sad
3. All Broken Hearts Break Differently
4. Old D-35
5. American Stooge
6. Where The Beauty Is
7. Nocturne
8. Secret Keepers
9. Asking For A Friend
10. Everybodys Got Something
11. Between The Dirt And The Stars
