Recorded earlier this year at The Neptune, Seattle, Hiss Golden Messenger has released the first in a series of live releases recorded on the Hiss Mobile Recording Unit (HMRU, for short).
Wise Eyes: Live at The Neptune, Seattle, WA, 2/25/22 is available now via Bandcamp featuring 17 tracks, Recorded & Mixed by Luc Suèr and Mastered by Chris Boerner. It also features some beautiful artwork by Darryl Norsen.
This 17-song performance—among the best from the Winter Tour of 2021-2022—finds the band in top form and full flight, drawing on deep cuts and crowd favourites from across their expansive catalogue, and including barn-burning renditions of Merle Haggard’s “Mama Tried” and the Grateful Dead’s “Bertha.”
MC Taylor: “50% of sales proceeds will benefit the National Network of Abortion Funds. Each future release will partner with a different organization doing good work in our collective universe.
“We pulled into Seattle on a Friday. February 25th. We’d been on this particular leg of [the] tour for about a month, and on the West Coast for about ten days. We were in good shape. Hiss had not been to Seattle—a town that has always warmly welcomed us—since 2019, and we were coming off a series of shows, including two nights in Portland, a gig at the Fillmore in San Francisco, and The Troubadour in Los Angeles, that were all sold-out. Anticipation was high in the Emerald City.
“We were playing at the Neptune Theatre in Seattle’s University District neighborhood, a place that none of us had ever been before. Built in 1921, the Neptune is a 1000-person capacity room split between a main floor and a balcony and featuring nautical, King Neptune-themed décor. It’s a rambling, rococo place, and the vibe was good from the moment we loaded in. While visiting our friend Tucker Martine’s studio in Portland the day before, we had been given a heads-up by Jessica of Deep Sea Diver and Natalie, Allison and Meegan of the band Joseph, northwestern natives all, that the Neptune was within rock-throwing distance from a restaurant called Thai Tom that they unanimously considered the greatest Thai food they had ever had. They steered us right.
“Everybody in the band and crew felt that this performance was a fitting inaugural release for our Hiss Live series. On a good night, Hiss vibrates the air at a very specific frequency, and I can hear that in this Seattle show. I can also hear all kinds of joy: The joy of the five of us onstage together, the inside musical jokes and the delight in making music together, and the joy of the audience hearing music that moves them, and most importantly of all, the joy of all of us in that building, everyone, moving beyond our worries and stress and anxiety for just a little while to make something hopeful together. Does that make sense? We were all part of the performance. That’s a notion that really planted itself in my marrow after years of not being able to play, after feeling the futility of COVID-induced Zoom performances: We are all part of the performance.
“Wise Eyes was recorded and mixed by Luc Suer, and mastered by Chris Boerner. Design and artwork by Darryl Norsen. All songs except “Mama Tried” and “Bertha” composed by M.C. Taylor. Special thanks to Chris Frisina, Carley Bingham and Merge Records. Hiss Golden Messenger is M.C. Taylor, Chris Boerner, Alex Bingham, Sam Fribush and Nick Falk. Curious about hearing a scorching Saturday night show in Charleston? Highlights from two legendary sold-out nights in Denver? A spare and intimate solo performance in the middle of winter from frosty London town? Or even demos and sketches that turned into songs you know and love on Hiss albums? All of these, and much more, are fair game with our Hiss Live series.”
—MC Taylor, Durham, NC, 2 Aug 2022
Also available via Nugs.net