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30% off! (Applied at checkout)
Sold out
30% off! (Applied at checkout)
Liam Kazar - Due North
£10.00
£10.00
Liam Kazar makes joyful rock songs so irresistible they feel timeless. Just ask Jeff Tweedy. “I love everything about Liam.
His voice, his songs, the way he plays instruments, his smile, his
cooking... Everything,” says Tweedy. ”Whenever I hear one of
his songs for the first time I almost immediately start thinking
to myself, ‘oh yeah! This song! I love this song.’ It’s a magic
trick very few people can pull off: making something brand new
sound like a cherished memory.” But on Kazar’s debut album
Due North, out via Woodist and Mare Records, the album’s
ten tracks are full of so much charm, wit, and heart it can’t be a
sleight of hand.
The Kansas City-based, Chicago-raised musician and
acclaimed chef / founder of the Armenian pop-up restaurant
Isfahan, describes the making of Due North as a personal
revelation, where the more he wrote the more his songs
showed what kind of artist he’s always wanted to be. While
he’s consistently been a dream bandmate over the past several
years, performing with artists like Tweedy, Steve Gunn, Daniel
Johnston, and more, making his own songs presented a chance to
finally find his own voice. But figuring out how to step out was
a rewarding challenge. “This record kind of all stemmed from a
conversation I had with Jeff,” says Kazar. “I showed him some
of my earliest songs I was working on and he told me, ‘It sounds
like you’re writing for the people in your bands, you’re not
writing for yourself.’ He was completely right. I was not writing
songs for myself.” With that needed insight, Kazar decided to
start from scratch and write songs that felt like himself.
“These songs totally blew me away the first time I heard
them: they sound like David Bowie meets the Band,” says
Mare Records co-founder Kevin Morby. Due North was mixed
by Sam Evian at his Flying Cloud Recordings Studio in upstate
New York. Along with drummer Spencer Tweedy and bassist
Lane Beckstrom, Kazar enlists keyboardist Dave Curtin
(Woongi), co-producer James Elkington on pedal steel, as well
as Ohmme and Andrew Sa on backing vocals.
His voice, his songs, the way he plays instruments, his smile, his
cooking... Everything,” says Tweedy. ”Whenever I hear one of
his songs for the first time I almost immediately start thinking
to myself, ‘oh yeah! This song! I love this song.’ It’s a magic
trick very few people can pull off: making something brand new
sound like a cherished memory.” But on Kazar’s debut album
Due North, out via Woodist and Mare Records, the album’s
ten tracks are full of so much charm, wit, and heart it can’t be a
sleight of hand.
The Kansas City-based, Chicago-raised musician and
acclaimed chef / founder of the Armenian pop-up restaurant
Isfahan, describes the making of Due North as a personal
revelation, where the more he wrote the more his songs
showed what kind of artist he’s always wanted to be. While
he’s consistently been a dream bandmate over the past several
years, performing with artists like Tweedy, Steve Gunn, Daniel
Johnston, and more, making his own songs presented a chance to
finally find his own voice. But figuring out how to step out was
a rewarding challenge. “This record kind of all stemmed from a
conversation I had with Jeff,” says Kazar. “I showed him some
of my earliest songs I was working on and he told me, ‘It sounds
like you’re writing for the people in your bands, you’re not
writing for yourself.’ He was completely right. I was not writing
songs for myself.” With that needed insight, Kazar decided to
start from scratch and write songs that felt like himself.
“These songs totally blew me away the first time I heard
them: they sound like David Bowie meets the Band,” says
Mare Records co-founder Kevin Morby. Due North was mixed
by Sam Evian at his Flying Cloud Recordings Studio in upstate
New York. Along with drummer Spencer Tweedy and bassist
Lane Beckstrom, Kazar enlists keyboardist Dave Curtin
(Woongi), co-producer James Elkington on pedal steel, as well
as Ohmme and Andrew Sa on backing vocals.