Jess Klein - Dreaming Aloud (2026) [Hi-Res]

A Note from Jess:

Dreaming Aloud began with a reckoning and a reclamation. I’d spent too long wrapped up in my ego, trying to prove something. To audiences, to critics, to myself. Around the time I wrote “All It’ll Take” and “Delay the Sunrise”, something shifted. I stopped trying to arrive somewhere and instead started trying to be where I was. That changed me - gave me more space. I remembered the joy and transformative power of the creative act itself. I waded in.

Some of that spaciousness also came from the instrument I was working with. I'd been playing with alternate tunings, and when I tuned a borrowed baritone acoustic to AEADEA, something opened up. The chord shapes felt strange and new. The resonance was different - lower, broader. It felt like finding a room in a house you've lived in for years that you'd somehow never noticed, and really wanted to spend some time appreciating - a dream space.

I spoke with my longtime producer, Mark Addison at the Aerie in Austin. I told him I wanted something like a cross between Astral Weeks and Led Zeppelin II. Spacious but impactful. He was down.

In the studio, I decided, maybe for the first time in my life, to really trust the process, and it felt magical. Mark is one of those rare collaborators who can hear what a song needs and help get you there without pushing. The musicians who joined us — Luke Leverett, Colin Brooks, John Chipman, John Pointer, Betty Soo, Pat Byrne, Sheridan Roalson — brought so much presence to their performances. Seasoned pros, at the tops of their respective games, just enjoying creating together. There’s nothing better. They were so generous with their ideas, their musicality. It was, again, like a dream, to create this way.

We live in a hard time. The fear, the grief. A lot of bullshit telling us we should give up. We’re too late. We’re doomed. Fuck that. I made Dreaming Aloud as an act of resistance — and as an invitation. To sit down. To ask questions. To come back stronger. To feel the dew on your feet in the morning and remember that you are alive and that love is still, stubbornly, the best that we can do.

— Jess Klein, Hillsborough, NC