These days, most music is made by people working alone in their rooms. A lot of it is great, but too much of it feels like the work of people who are cut off from each other. We think we work best when we make things together. That’s how we recorded New Love Stories.
(You can pre-order it here.)
We wanted New Love Stories to be a warm, intimate record, so we chose Richmond’s Minimum Wage Recording, one of those magical spaces where even the silences are full of music. The place is heavy with some kind of mystique. It’s in a converted carriage house in the Oregon Hill neighborhood of Richmond, where generations of art students and punk bands made their homes (and where the house that inspired “The House on Laurel Street” still stands). The recording area is cozy, carpeted, and basementy; the upstairs is draped with hanging plants and painted in bright contrasting colors.
Lance Koehler, Minimum Wage’s owner and engineer (and drummer/co-founder of No BS! Brass) is a thoughtful, kind, funny collaborator who has worked with or recorded just about every musician in Central Virginia. His studio’s tongue-in-cheek catchphrase is “It’s not as bad as it sounds.” We told Lance we wanted the album to sound like wood and air and musicians playing together, and he just nodded and said, “That’ll work.” Lance has the gift of being simultaneously relaxing and definitively clear when you should try another take. We’re looking forward to getting back to Minimum Wage as soon as we can. If you’re a musician in Richmond, you’ve either worked there or you should.
Curtis Fye mixed the record. We met Curtis when he was the recording engineer for our first album and knew he was friendly and talented and hardworking. Until last year I didn’t know about his mixing resume. But early last fall, I was listening to the recent Doug Richards Orchestra project and was so blown away by the mix that I found myself looking up the credits to see who’d done it. It was Curtis’s work — and that was that. I asked him to mix New Love Stories. He did it beautifully. He has a gifted musician’s ear and a brilliant technician’s skills.
We really wanted to make an album that sounded like a band in a room, so we didn’t bring in a lot of session players for intricate musical elaboration, like we did last time. Two official extra Humans — our good friends Bob Miller (trumpet) and Liza Kate (voice) — show up on the record. And Bob Weston of Chicago Mastering Service mastered this one, same as the first.
New Love Stories is an examination of the things that connect us, and one of those is the beauty of making art with other people. A small troupe of collaborators made this album together. Their hands and hearts and minds and ears made it what it is.
New Love Stories will be released May 3 and will not be posted on streaming platforms — we list the reasons here. You can preorder it now.
Huzzah!! It is a great time for a new album!
Can’t wait for the New Love Stories! Nice shout out - deserving - to Lance and Minimum Wage.