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Dawn Richard, the ever-inventive New Orleans artist, has linked up with multi-instrumentalist Spencer Zahn for a new album, Pigments, set to arrive Oct. 21 via Merge Records.
Pigments is described as one long composition filled with various movements that blend jazz, classical, and ambient elements together. To preview the album, Richard and Zahn shared the four songs that comprise the album’s first movement, “Coral,” “Sandstone,” “Indigo,” and “Vantablack.” The latter track arrives with a music video that marks Dawn’s directorial debut.
In a statement, Richard said the narrative that came out of the album’s songs was about “someone painting with broken brushes.” She continued, “I felt like the tools that I and other people like me were dealt weren’t shiny. Yet we still painted these beautiful pictures. This album is what it means to be a dreamer and finally reach a place where you’ve decided to love the pigments that you have.”
Zahn and Richard crafted Pigments with the help of several musicians, including Stuart Bogie, Mike Haldeman, Malcolm Parson, Dave Scalia, Kirk Schoenherr, Jas Walton, and Doug Wiselman. The album follows Richard’s celebrated 2021 effort, Second Line, while Zahn’s most recent solo project, Pale Horizon, arrived in May. Richard and Zahn previously worked together on the latter’s 2018 album, People of the Dawn.
Pigments Track List
1. “Coral”
2. “Sandstone”
3. “Indigo”
4. “Vantablack”
5. “Sienna”
6. “Cerulean”
7. “Opal”
8. “Saffron”
9. “Saffron”
10. “Cobalt”
11. “Umber.”
