Stephen Clair’s grandfather was always singing from behind the wheel while occasionally opening the car door to spit. It was Grandpap who played young Stephen a Johnny Cash record when he was five years old, and that’s everything Stephen remembers from his youth.
Best known for his wry humor and guitar stylings, the Beacon, NY musician has been a fixture on the Americana, alt-country, and dorky independent rock scene since his 1997 debut, Altoona Hotel, named for the town his grandfather called home.
He’s released many more albums over the years and toured and done all the things, experiencing all the near misses of life in the biz. Critics and his family love him first. Everyone else has come around in their own sweet time.
Rawboned, his latest effort, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (due out November 17th – PRE-ORDER), features only Clair and a guitar, except when it’s Clair and a rickety piano. The songs are miniature stories, the essence of emotion, and the arrangements and performances fit accordingly. “Every note, every part —including the air around it—is intentional,” says Clair. “I recorded it alone, in a room, over months, guitar in my lap, mousing with one hand, groping through the microphones surrounding me. I recorded take after take of each song. What you hear are complete, intact performances of each song. No punching in, no edits, no cutting and pasting. Each track on the record is a complete performance.”
There’s air in these songs, for sure. Every melody counts, as does each breath, word, and the space in between. Repetition is another device Clair takes full advantage of. Repeating words or lines can show longing, anticipation, and even obsession. The singer in “Watering the Flowers” and “Pizza and Fairy Tales” uses this to full effect. The sanguine narrator provides the play-by-play as they incessantly water the flowers, waiting, wondering, attempting to keep their shit together.
Today Glide is excited to premiere the standout track “The World Has Changed,” a slowly picked work of intimate folk that offers a comment on our current societal state. As if stating the obvious, Clair offers lyrics that examine where we have arrived at our post-pandemic society that is plagued by war, divisiveness, and climate change. He does all of this with his wisened and soulful vocals accompanied by only his acoustic guitar.
Clair describes the inspiration behind the song:
“Let’s face it: ‘The World Has Changed.’ We realize we no longer recognize the world for what we thought it was. Maybe it was never what we thought it was. In fact, it was never our world. We are just passing through, my friends. The sooner we get comfortable with that the better.”
LISTEN:
