English singer/songwriter Beth Orton shares “Forever Young” today, a new preview from her first LP in six years and Partisan Records debut Weather Alive, out September 23rd. “Forever Young” is an engrossing, nearly six-minute cornerstone of Weather Alive with vocals ringing through an old synth played by ambient artist Dustin O’Halloran (A Winged Victory for the Sullen), backing vocals from the “sublimely odd” (NY Magazine) Grey McMurray and double bass by Orton’s frequent collaborator, Ali Friend of the London instrumental outfit Red Snapper.
Weather Alive has already established itself as one of the most anticipated releases of Orton’s celebrated career, with the title track (released in May) earning widespread praise in from The New York Times, NME, and Pitchfork who called it “a slow-burning tour de force” in a Best New Track review. Rolling Stone added that the song is “the perfect ethereal glue,” and Stereogum stated simply “if the title track is anything to go by, holy shit are we in for something”.
Watch the “Forever Young” video directed by Stephen Ellcock and Jonathan Reid-Edwards below:
“Beth originally had the idea of looking at women as mystics and witchcraft as a form of spiritual connection rather than evil,” says Dir. Ellcock. “Running with this, we wanted to make something that took you on a journey both cosmic and macrocosmic, from outer to inner space and back again. A kaleidoscope of archetypal imagery and shifting perspectives seen through a miraculous scrying glass, it subverts stereotypes whilst celebrating the power of intuition and the persistence of hope and magic in a treacherous universe.”
Fully at the helm of her own work, Orton chose collaborators for Weather Alive including drummer Tom Skinner (Sons Of Kemet, The Smile) and bassist Tom Herbert with whom she trusted to add nuanced emotional color to the music.
“It’s true that I’ve spent a lifetime handing elements of my work over to men in a room before I’m ready and having them reinterpret my perception, add chords to make something else happen and sometimes in the process take the music to a place I had no intention of going, it’s subtle the ways that could happen but to be able to hold my own intention throughout has been a powerful experience.”
“I wanted to be one of those women who are all sorted and put together some day but at 40, I kept getting messier and things just kept going wrong,” Orton continues. “This record explores all of that. I’m talking about my experiences possibly in a more personal way then I ever have but the important part will be how this music makes other people feel. It’s not a finished masterpiece, it is a collaboration with time, of someone struggling to make sense. And in that struggle, something beautiful got made.”
Recently, Orton rang in the the 25th-anniversary of her Mercury Prize-nominated 1996 folktronica album Trailer Park on the road at arenas with Alanis Morissette in EU and the UK. This Fall, she will play a handful of UK and EU festivals before a headline UK tour through October including a KOKO Camden show on October 9th.
BETH ORTON TOUR DATES
23 JUL 2022 / UK / Suffolk / Latitude Festival
19 AUG 2022 / UK / Devon / Beautiful Days Festival
21 AUG 2022 / IE / Bangor County Down / Open House Festival
7 OCT 2022 / UK / Birmingham / Academy 2
8 OCT 2022 / UK / Brighton / St. Bartholomew’s Church
9 OCT 2022 / UK / London / KOKO
10 OCT 2022 / UK / Norwich / Arts Centre
12 OCT 2022 / UK / Bristol / St. George’s
13 OCT 2022 / UK / Glasgow / Classic Grand
15 OCT 2022 / UK / Manchester / RCMN Concert Hall
16 OCT 2022 / UK / Leeds / Brudenell Social Club
