Orion

Description

Here is a young man who dreams of following in the footsteps of those who carve out a centuries-old groove. Mr. Byrd’s musical life was born between Paris and Amsterdam, but it is clearly across the Atlantic that it draws its roots. While he was dragging his backside in the shadow of Ilgen-Nur (bassists are never in the spotlight, especially not in guitar-driven power-pop bands), Mr. Byrd began composing his own songs to express his moods. Today, the young German takes a step forward for the first time, the one that separates the rhythm section from the singer-songwriter. Mountain is his first single. And it’s a little slap in the face. He was right to believe he had something to say, to share. Settled in the gap between the pompous flamboyance of War On Drugs, who dream of taking up the torch from Dire Straits, and the precious intimacy of many artists signed to Captured Tracks (Chris Cohen, Mac DeMarco, Wild Nothing), he delivers a song whose embers die out before reaching incandescence. A small peak of frustration and sullen melancholy — we’re also including below the “naked” version recorded in a live session to complete the demonstration. Dressed up with a video featuring Danish dancer and choreographer Nana Anine on a Normandy beach, the young man here signs off with exactly the kind of song we cherish all the more because we can so easily project our own blurred daydreams onto it. We still know nothing about what comes next, but we hope to hear more soon.