OPENING FOR THE BLACK KEYS THIS SUMMER

KICKS OFF HEADLINING FALL TOUR FOLLOWING AUSTIN CITY LIMITS MUSIC FESTIVAL DEBUT IN OCTOBER

NEW DAN AUERBACH-PRODUCED ALBUM STRANGE TIME TO BE ALIVE OUT AUGUST 19 VIA EASY EYE SOUND

LISTEN TO EARLY JAMES CRITIQUE ONLINE DISCOURSE AND SHOWBOATING BILLIONAIRES ON RACING TO A RED LIGHT HERE

TORONTO, ON – July 14, 2022 – Early James will release his Dan Auerbach-produced second album, Strange Time To Be Alive, on August 19 via Easy Eye Sound, and the Alabama native will spend much of the summer and fall on tour in support of the record. Early James will perform a special album release show at the Station Inn in Nashville, TN on August 19, after which he will begin a run of dates opening a leg of The Black Keys’ summer tour. Early James will return to Nashville in September for AmericanaFest, and then make his Austin City Limits Music Festival debut on October 14 before starting his recently announced fall headlining tour two days later.

Early James’s lyrics contain equal parts poetic observation and candid introspection and fantastically warped humour—a dynamic established in the very first lines of the newly released single Racing To A Red Light: “Oh Lord, I think I just might/Be betting on a thrown fight/Between a man and a mannequin/Just lost to a banana skin.” Sparked from a bit of dialogue from True Detective season one, Racing To A Red Light unfolds in languid rhythms and spectral guitar tones as Early James quietly vents a litany of frustrations (e.g., the dearth of original thought in online discourse, the showboating behaviour of billionaire moguls). Listen here.

“At the time I was getting fed up with seeing the same comments copied-and-pasted from the safety of anonymity on the internet, from people who can’t think up their own response to anything happening in the world,” says Early James. “That song’s a subtle dis to all that, and also to the people who think it’s a better idea to race to Mars on a rocket than to try to fix the planet we actually live on.”

Strange Time To Be Alive is the sound of an artist sublimely out of step with the world. With all the charmed eccentricity of a true poet conjuring the ghosts of great southern gothic writers from Eudora Welty to William Faulkner, Early James takes in the endless absurdity he sees around him, then alchemizes his unease into a glorious patchwork of musical idioms: forsaken blues and contemplative folk songs, brooding murder ballads and lovestruck piano tunes. Early James ultimately extracts a certain magic from the madness, imbuing even the most painful truth-telling with a wild-eyed joie de vivre.

The follow-up to 2020’s Singing For My Supper (hailed by MOJO as a “luminous debut”), Strange Time To Be Alive came to life in three whirlwind days at Easy Eye Sound in Nashville, TN. Early James joined forces with such esteemed musicians as guitarist Tom Bukovac (Willie Nelson, Keb’ Mo’), drummer Jay Bellerose (Sharon Van Etten, Allen Toussaint), keyboardist Mike Rojas (Tyler Childers, Yola) as well as Early James’ longtime bandmate Adrian Marmolejo on upright bass.

TOUR DATES:
Aug 19 - Nashville, TN - Station Inn
Aug 24 - West Palm Beach, FL - iThink Amphitheater ***
Aug 25 - Tampa, FL - MidFlorida Credit Union ***
Aug 27 - Atlanta, GA - Ameris Bank Amphitheater ***
Aug 28 - Huntsville, AL - Huntsville Amphitheater ***
Aug 30 - Charleston, SC - Volvo Stadium ***
Sept 1 - Raleigh, NC - Coastal Credit Union ***
Sept 3 - Cincinnati, OH - Riverbend Music Center ***
Sept 6 - Toronto, ON - Budweiser Stage ***
Sept 7 - Detroit, MI - DTE Energy Music Theater ***
Sept 9 - Cleveland, OH - Blossom Music Center ***
Sept 11 - Roswell, GA - Chattahoochee Nature Center
Sept 15-17 - Nashville, TN - AmericanaFest 
Oct 2 - Athens, GA - Wildwood Revival Festival
Oct 14 - Austin, TX - Austin City Limits Music Festival
Oct 16 - Little Rock, AR - The White Water Tavern
Oct 18 - Atlanta, GA - Vinyl
Oct 21 - Washington, DC - Jammin Java
Oct 22 - Philadelphia, PA - World Café (Upstairs)
Oct 23 - Boston, MA - Atwood’s Tavern
Oct 25 - Brooklyn, NY - Union Pool
Oct 27 - Pittsburgh, PA - Club Café
Oct 28 - Columbus, OH - Ace of Cups
Oct 29 - Chicago, IL - Golden Dagger
Oct 30 - Davenport, IA - Racoon Motel
*** supporting The Black Keys 

DOWNLOAD – press photo | DOWNLOAD – album artwork