Matthew Barber - Big Romance (2014)

Tracklist

01. Hold Me
02. Magnet Eyes
03. Big Romance
04. When She Comes Over Me
05. On The 505
06. Lose Your Love
07. Magic Greg
08. If Our Timing Is True
09. Dance of the Honeybee
10. Still Beating



Matthew Barber returns with Big Romance his 8th studio album, available May 27th on the Outside Music Label. Barber, who self-produced his last two albums, jumped at the opportunity to have Jayhawks frontman, and leader of the Americana movement, Gary Louris come on board “I’ve been a lifelong fan of Gary’s music with The Jayhawks” says Barber, adding that “it was a thrill to get to make a record with one of my contemporary musical heroes.”

Big Romance has soul-searching ballads, foot-stomping rockers, some groovy mid-tempo tunes and hooks-a-plenty. Tragedy is explored in both personal loss with an ode to a departed friend in the song“Magic Greg”, and in the events that took place on the 505 streetcar line that runs along Toronto’s Dundas Street, steps away from Barber’s house on the evening of July 27, 2013. Big Romance also features guitar and vocals from Louris and a guest appearance by Barber’s sister Jill who appears on the lead track “Hold Me”.

“Big Romance is a wide-reaching idea on this record,” says Barber, a lyricist not shy to play a romantic card. “Some songs are about love, but others deal with death, despair and that which lurks in the shadows that are cast when the fires of passion burn bright. With this title I want to embrace the idea that while it can be artistically-liberating to give in to romance completely, one must also be able to step outside with a wink and recognize that sometimes romance goes no deeper than the stuff of a good song.

Big Romance was recorded in Toronto at Revolution Sound as well as Greg Keelor’s farmhouse studio in eastern Ontario.

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