Tracking the Tropics
another storm with a woman's name
Hello again from Marfa, Texas. It’s my last few days here before I head back to LA for a shoot next week for the new record. It’s always bittersweet saying goodbye to this place. On the one hand, it’s heaven on earth and I love it here. And on the other, I do really enjoy the conveniences of city life, and I miss my friends and my spots in LA.
It will be sad to go, but I’m looking forward to a little time in Los Angeles. Plus, that travel day (really it took two days) to Calgary from Marfa was no joke. I’ve got some radio promo stuff coming up and it will be so much easier to fly in and out of LAX, which…. says a lot.
Next week, on Tuesday August 11th, we are releasing the second single from the new album! This is another one that you’ve heard me play if you came to see me on my solo tours: Tracking the Tropics (pre-save here!).
The weatherman says he’s tracking the tropics
Another storm with a woman’s name
She’s catastrophic
It was one of those moments where the outside world reflected the way I felt on the inside. I was sitting alone in the lobby of a chain hotel, eating the free breakfast, when I looked up at the TV and saw a hurricane was coming, somewhere in the Gulf. In big letters across the screen it said, “TRACKING THE TROPICS”. I wrote that phrase down in my notes folder on my phone.
The song came together over the next few days. After it’s out next week, I’ll go into more about the story and how we made the song. This one had a few different directions in the studio, and although it was an early favorite for me and Shooter, we had to play with it and work with it more than a lot of the other ones to figure out where it wanted to go.
Tomorrow, I’ll release a little snippet of the song on my socials, but below I want to share a whole chorus with all of you, early.
An important part of this album cycle for me is letting my substack subscribers in on everything first. I’ve been thinking so much about the nature of the music business, the way we commodify our work and ourselves as artists, the ways we reach our audience, the road blocks we sometimes face in doing so. And it’s why I created this substack in the first place last year. I want a direct line to the people who care about what I’m doing.
So for my paid subscribers, this is a special thing just for us. Thanks for being here, buying my records and merch, coming to the shows. And if you want to join us behind the paywall, it’s $5/month, and now is kind of a good time because I’m going to keep rolling out special stuff all along the album campaign trail.
So below, the chorus of Tracking the Tropics and a snippet of the visualizer we are releasing with it next Tuesday.
Until next week,
Jess
