BLAKE MILLS’ NEW ALBUM MUTABLE SET OUT NOW
ON NEW DEAL RECORDS/VERVE
ON NEW DEAL RECORDS/VERVE
Album cover
GRAMMY-winning producer, composer, guitarist and songwriter Blake Mills’ new album, Mutable Set, is out now via New Deal Records/Verve. Listen/purchase the new record HERE. Mills will be celebrating the record’s release with a live performance on Pitchfork’s Instagram tonight, May 8, at 8pm Eastern. Tune in to the livestream HERE.
Mutable Set is Mills’ fourth studio album, crafted as a soundtrack to the emotional dissonance of modern life. The record reflects the push and pull of opposing forces: harmony and eerie tension, symphonious crescendos against moments of near silence, melodic yet unresolving chord progressions. The sonically warm album holds Mills’ guitar finger picking, gentle piano playing and relaxed tenor at its center.
Watch/share the video for first single, “Vanishing Twin”—directed by frequent Mills collaborator and Noh/Wave artist collective co-founder, Justin Daashuur Hopkins HERE, and the video for “Summer All Over,” directed by Kersti Jan Werdal HERE.
Recorded at the iconic Sound City Studios in Los Angeles, Mutable Set features Mills joined by Aaron Embry on keys (Elliot Smith, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros), Sam Gendel on saxophone (Vampire Weekend, Moses Sumney), Rob Moose on strings (Alabama Shakes, Bon Iver), Abe Rounds (Meshell Ndegocello, Andrew Bird) on drums and Pino Palladino (The Who, D’Angelo) on bass.
Mills is widely sought after as a producer, co-writer and session musician, collaborating with such diverse artists as Fiona Apple, Alabama Shakes, John Legend, Sara Bareilles, Jay-Z, Laura Marling, Phoebe Bridgers, Randy Newman and Perfume Genius, among others. He was nominated for “Producer of the Year” at the GRAMMY Awards in both 2015 and 2017, and his producing on Alabama Shakes’ Sound & Color won the “Best Alternative Music Album” GRAMMY Award in 2015.
Critical praise for Blake Mills’ Mutable Set:
“After producing albums for Alabama Shakes and Perfume Genius that redefined those artists’ sounds, he is now the clearest successor to turn-of-the-century studio sophisticate Jon Brion. And he brings all of that know-how, experience, and taste to his fourth LP, Mutable Set, a hushed collection that floats through the subconscious like a tender dream.”
“the intimate yet expansive vibe of songs like ‘Vanishing Twin,’ ‘Farsickness’ and ‘A Window Facing A Window’ feels germane to a moment in which, between four walls, the barriers between hours, days and weeks seem to have evaporated.”
“an enticing title that suggests burnished bodies on a California shoreline, is tragically beautiful, a warm hug from an old ghost. Rock and roll can't be all good times on the bleeding edge of environmental ruin.”
★★★★
“Mutable Set is best at its most surreal: first single Vanishing Twin is an astonishing track, a mysterious pulsating ballad that builds to a goose-pimple-inducing crescendo.”
★★★★
“Polymath’s quietly enchanting fourth solo album.”
“Lead single ‘Vanishing Twin,’ strikes me as a cinematic spin on Elliott Smith shot through with A Ghost Is Born-era Wilco vibes. I love it.”
“showcases [Mills’] talents with thoughtful, stunning, and haunting arrangements.”
“It's both meticulously crafted and warmly lived-in—Mills' close-miced vocals, the soft clatter of instruments and the room's empty space lend the feeling that you're there beside him, threads of sound dissipating in air.”
Photo credit: Kourtney Kyung Smith
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MUTABLE SET TRACKLIST
1. Never Forever
2. May Later 3. Eat My Dust 4. Money is the One True God 5. Summer All Over 6. Vanishing Twin 7. My Dear One 8. Farsickness 9. Mirror Box 10. Window Facing a Window 11. Off Grid |
BLAKE MILLS ONLINE
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