We first wrote about New England-born, Nashville-based songwriter Will Orchard way back in 2019, describing how he started out putting songs under the moniker LittleBoyBigHeadOnBike in the maximalist tradition of online experimental music, releasing prolifically and across genres. Recorded under his own name, the album Old Friends on the Mountain represented a change of approach, Orchard deciding to slow down and put increased focus on a smaller amount of material. “The tone is certainly nostalgic, and therefore focused on things now lost, though cast in a fond light,” as we wrote, “committed to bringing to life those moments, however mundane or ordinary, that help us become ourselves.”
The album felt like Will Orchard finding his groove, and subsequent releases have built upon it. The 2023 record Learning to Stand “unfurl[ed] with a careful tenderness,” as we wrote, “and [drew] the listener into a space of calm contemplation,” and his latest single ‘Down’ further pushes into the style. A dream-folk track which preaches the benefits submission within an overwhelming world, complicating the lines between playfulness, sadness and acquiescence. “I get lost in a maze / And I just lay down / I don’t want to be found,” Orchard sings in the opening lines. “There go the bright red dragons scorching overhead / I am a fading star gone to bed.”
When the light of the morning
Creeps over the hill
The honey bees find me
Eyes open and stillEven if I taste like everyone else
Can I at least have my own sweet finish
As I sink down, down?