Anyone that has been following us or Kyle Carey on twitter may have picked up the teaser screenshots she’s been sharing and the mounting excitement over this video premiere. So we’re very pleased to finally be able to unveil Let Them Be All Reprise which features on her latest album North Star:
Kyle shared the following about the video and song:
I wrote ‘Let Them Be All Reprise’ when I was still in college. I’d been listening to a good deal of Gillian Welch at the time, and I fell in love particularly with ‘Bright Morning Stars’ – with how she’d managed to write a new song that sounded old and timeless.
I was working at the admissions office of my college the summer after my junior year, and one afternoon I started humming a melody while filing applications. The words came soon after. The song is addressed to the mothers of men whose lives were once given in sacrifice of exploration, war and industry.
The director of my video, Adrian Garber, helped develop a storyline for the video that symbolically fits the essence of the words. I’ve been heavily influenced musically, like so many others, by the film ‘O Brother Where Art Thou’ and ‘Let Them Be All Reprise’ reminded me a bit of the traditional American hymn ‘Down to the River’ which is featured on the soundtrack of the film, and I also cover on my new album ‘North Star’ – albeit in Scottish Gaelic.
I came to Adrian with a handful of vague concepts (white dresses, a church, lanterns, a river) from which she developed a more macabre and compelling approach. On a symbolic level—each of the colors represents our grooms fate—which he is being bound or tied to.
The red for ‘foot soldiers’, the black for ‘coal miners’ and the grey for ‘ship captains’. When he comes up washed clean in the end, he is being born into the world with his fate already decided. And those who have been instrumental in that decision – the divine beings if you will – are gone.
The song features Natalie Haas on cello, Katie McNally on fiddle, Ben Walker in guitar, Catriona McKay on Harmonium and Chico Huff on bass. The video was filmed and edited by Dan Kennedy.
Kyle will be on tour in Europe in 2016 including a performance at the prestigious Celtic Connections festival. Full upcoming tour dates can be found here.
North Star is out now, order it on Kyle’s website: www.kyleannecarey.com