BLACK SWIFT

About the Songs
Think of a dark place of your life. The valley you’ve had to walk through, the desert you’ve had to crawl through. What do you wish that you had at that time? The songs on the upcoming Black Swift EP are to help you through the valley. They are songs about that waiting time – the time where the questions are at the forefront and the answers seem far away. They are songs about the dangers of bitterness sneaking in the process of going through challenging circumstances. They are songs about that desire to be filled, the desire to be drenched with rain when you’re parched in the desert. They are songs of encouragement to tell you to keep moving on, to face hardships yet not to fall into despair and a reminder that this time shall pass.

About the Production
Building amps from transistor radios, tracking vocals through headphones, playing guitar through a light bulb, or a tape machine, or a Leslie….these were some of the things that you’ll hear on Black Swift’s new EP “Desert Rain.” </span><span>In 2018, Arno from Castle Rohrsdorf (where they record our last album, ‘SEE ME HUMAN’) approached Black Swift to ask if they would like to be the band for the recording workshop lead by one of the top female producers of our time, Sylvia Massy. Working alongside a long list of musicians she has worked with from Tool, System of a Down, Johnny Cash, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Prince, the Melvins, Foo Fighters and many more. So back in September, Black Swift headed to the Castle. And for the first two days, they were the band Sylvia was recording for her workshop. 20 producers and engineers from all over Europe filled the control room observing Sylvia and her magic.

About the Music
Musically, Black Swift traveled to the desert. Many of the bands Black Swift and the leading front, Sally Grayson has been inspired by over the last years are from desert regions: Calexico, XIXA, Queens of the Stone Age, Bombino, Tinariwen…. All these bands carry with them a certain “desert” sound and quality.

Grayson, hailing from Michigan and Minnesota, and now in southern Germany with her German band is far from the desert, but she somehow felt a connection with these hot, dry, lonely and beautiful sounds, and has felt a need to cling on to them.

Part of the connection for her, personally, has to do with the spaghetti western part of the desert sounds. These sounds drum up that nostalgic homesickness in me. Grayson tells, “On Sundays, I’d sit with my Dad on the sofa and watch Westerns. I can still hear “Rawhide” and Morricone’s lonely harmonicas sing in the soundtracks.”

Black Swift's SEE ME HUMAN Vinyl LP comes with a beautifully designed art magazine with artwork by singer/guitarist Sally Grayson. Each song has a collage that is uniquely made to visualize the content of the song. The pages include the song lyrics, a short description of the background of each song, and in the centrefold of the magazine is a protest poster! Grab yours today while they are still available!

Black Swift’s Album “The World Howls,” ranges in style from Tarantino road trip Rock to Morricone, to Fugazi to Tom Waits. Together with her collaborators Black Swift worked steadily on this album for over a year. The bones of the song were written by Grayson, but the rest has come from a variety of musicians who helped arrange and record in numerous places in America and Germany. “The World Howls” features Jerome Fontamillas (Switchfoot), Beverly Fre$h, Nate Lehner (The Guilty Wanted), Burkhard Mayer-Anderson, Mike Gunther (Mike Gunther & his Restless Souls), Jayathi Kyle (Black Audience), Stefanie Haecker and more. Of all her collaborators, her most consistent on this album are co-producer David Arzt (Jumbo Jet) who played and arranged on most of the songs on the album, Steffen Eifert (Same Same Here) on drums, and Tobias Unrath on bass. From energetic post-punk indie rock to epic dark ballads, to soul infused &amp; blues influenced story telling, “The World Howls” stretches the gamet of songwriting and soundscapes.