Kirty - We Are All On Fire (2021) [Hi-Res]

By Megan LaPierre

Toronto multi-instrumentalist and Fast Romantics band member Kirty is releasing her solo album We Are All on Fire on August 20. The forthcoming LP on Postwar Records follows her 2016 self-titled sophomore offering, and Exclaim! has the premiere of the video for "Turn You On."

Co-produced with longtime collaborator Joshua Van Tassel and Fast Romantics' own Matthew Angus, We Are All on Fire's nine tracks present a deeply personal snapshot of Kirty's early 30s — coming face to face with questions of mortality, impermanence and love in all its forms.

The artist kept the album's recording experience intimate. She said in a statement, "Josh played drums, Graeme Moffat played bass, and Matthew played a smattering of other instruments. Some of it happened before the pandemic with us all in a room, but we finished it separately. All the same, there's this half-fictional image of the four of us in a circle, playing this live in a garage someplace in my head."

As for the "Turn You On" video, it was directed and conceptualized by Anne Douris and features award-winning Canadian actor-comedian Chris Locke, plus a feast fit for a king — cheese balls and all. Kirty plays court jester to the metaphorical music industry and is literally consumed as one of Locke's bourgeois indulgences. She understands the nature of the game, repeating, "I'll turn you on and be forgotten."

The track's rumbling low frequencies feel like a summer thunderstorm rolling in. Juxtaposed with Kirty's distinctive soft croon, maybe it's more of an ominous sun shower; either way, the hungry skies are getting their fill.