LISTEN TO NEW SINGLE ONCE HELD MY HEART TODAY

TORONTO, ON – May 26, 2023 – Following the release of her beautifully melancholic lead single, Lonely As I Can Be, Sleepy Jean returns today with Once Held My Heart, the next offering from her forthcoming debut full-length, Shoot Me In A Dream. Set for release on July 21, the album pays homage to the music of the ‘60s, sequenced to feel like the soundtrack to a Tarantino-esque Bond film, while maintaining a fresh and modern feel. Listen to Once Held My Heart today for a taste.

"Written primarily in the passenger seat of a car headed north from New Orleans, Once Held My Heart was my way of grappling with the impending feeling that the relationship I found myself in would die upon crossing the Canadian border," Sleepy Jean reflects.

Recorded over the course of a year with engineer/producer, Dajaun Martineau (Kathleen Edwards, Lydia Ainsworth, Rob Moir), Shoot Me in a Dream pays homage to icons like Les Paul, Nancy Sinatra & Dusty Springfield, and is equally inspired by the alt-country, surf rock and pop standards of the 1960’s. Featuring horn performances from Bryden Baird (Bahamas, Feist) and additional mixes from Kenneth Roy Meehan (Daniel Romano, Kacy & Clayton, Julianna Riolino), the 11 song effort stretches across space, time and genre to nod at the bygone eras that inspired its creation.

“As we were piecing the album together, I started to realize how much I had drawn from my father’s family story lyrically,” Sleepy Jean reflects.  “My dad was born in Uganda to Parsi parents (ethnically Persian people of Zoroastrian faith who fled what is now known as Iran in the 7^th, landing in India) in the mid-60s. When Idi Amin came into power in the early 70s, my bupawaiji (grandfather) was placed on a hit list as he was smuggling political enemies out of the country, and was part owner in the first major bus company operating in Kampala – Uganda’s capital. My father’s family fled to India and were never able to return to Uganda.”

This deeply personal storytelling shines on Shoot Me In A Dream, with Sleepy Jean weaving familial stories throughout her songwriting. How Soon is loosely about the idea of hiding in plain sight, while No Tomorrow speaks to Sleepy Jean’s bapaiji’s (grandmother’s) pain of leaving her home country and never being able to visit the grave of her daughter ever again. Lead single, Lonely As I Can Be, is told from her bupawaiji’s viewpoint, as he sent the family away ahead of himself, and stayed behind trying to take out as much money as he could; and Six Feet Deep (with love) pulls tidbits from the time Sleepy Jean’s then 7-year-old father watched Amin’s soldiers shoot someone while on a family picnic. 

It’s the sound of a song you half remember. A shiver of remembrance, tingling along your spine. A glimpse of a now-scratched record. You pause, reaching into the dark recess of memory, returning with the sensation you’ve forgotten what you once knew... until you realize: there was no recollection to be found.

Sleepy Jean’s spaghetti western-infused Americana reimagines the sounds of yesteryear in a blend all her own. Hailing from Welland, ON, Sleepy Jean – the moniker/alter-ego of singer-songwriter Katey Gatta – independently released her debut EP, Idle Hands, amassing over 100,000 cumulative streams. Now armed with her backing band, the Deadstock Three (featuring members of TALK, Cat Clyde’s Shitbats, and alumni of Great Lake Swimmers, Jill Barber and Deep Dark Woods), Sleepy Jean eagerly awaits the release of her debut full-length. Stay tuned for more to come from Shoot Me In A Dream.

SHOOT ME IN A DREAM TRACKLIST: 
1. How Soon?
2. Six Feet Deep (with love)
3. Left Handed Delights
4. Once Held My Heart
5. Lonely As I Can Be
6. No Tomorrow
7. Like a Lover
8. Human of the Race
9. Sweet Tooth
10. That's Ok, That's Alright
11. Mean Ol' Moon

DOWNLOAD – Shoot Me In A Dream album artwork | DOWNLOAD – hi-res photo
DOWNLOAD – Once Held My Heart single artwork