Last month we introduced Rodeo Clown, the forthcoming debut album by Montreal quintet Nora Kelly Band on Mint Records with single ‘Lay Down Girl’. A country-inflected track which went some way to contextualising the image of the album’s title. “A figure,” as we put it, “made to smile no matter the mood.” As lead Nora Kelly herself explained, the lyrics served as self-directed advice “to stop staying put, acting sweet and putting everyone else first.” To move beyond the quest for validation and constant urge to please in order to retake what truly matters.
Latest single ‘Roswell’ channels a similar sentiment, though swaps out the playful country bop for an altogether slower, wistful croon. It explores not only the tantalising prospect of mystery in this world (as per its title), but moreover how appetites for such possibilities change with the fickle fortunes of life. “A stargazer told me, only cause I asked / He’d seen a thousand UFOs in the past,” Kelly sings in the opening lines. “But he reassured me they’d all been explained / And this had me depressed for many days.” Though any inclination to reduce the complexities of existence is the territory of the overconfident, and once humbled such men come crawling back. As if life is not a process of gaining understanding but one of letting go of such fancies. A fact that Kelly circles back to in the second half:
Some men, all they want is a beauty queen
A woman to support them in all of their dreams
But give me a call when the going gets less clear
At the end of your life you remember what’s weird
Watch the video directed by Sarah Bradshaw below:
Rodeo Clown is out on the 25th August via Mint Records and you can pre-order it now.
The album cover features photography by Gabie Allain, make-up by Neve Kerry and design by Owen Ostrowski