The enchanting first single off Alaska Reid’s debut album ‘Disenchanter’, “Back to This” is dreamy and dripping in soul-stirring nostalgia: A daydream come to life, and a stunning return from one of our generation’s most striking singer/songwriters.
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“Back to This” is admittedly brand new, and yet it hits the ears with black-and-white hues and sepia tones. Alaska Reid’s first single in nearly two years is enchantingly dreamy and dripping in soul-stirring nostalgia – the kind that feels wondrous and hits close to home, even if it’s for a time we’ve never known and a place we’ve never been. If one of the magics of music is that it’s transportive, then consider us fully transported.
Outside the cosmic club
Seeing rain in your eyes tonight
Do you feel caged in under this big sky
Wrapped in you and the mountains
Yeah I’ve imagined it a thousand times
Running through these dreams
I want to go back to this
Come with me
Can’t live if we don’t take chances
Released March 7, 2023 via Luminelle Recordings, “Back to This” is the head-turning lead single taken off Alaska Reid’s forthcoming debut album Disenchanter, out July 14th. Produced alongside her longtime collaborator A. G. Cook, the track is light, yet heavy; relaxed, yet intense – a perfect marriage of what on paper might seem like opposites, but in practice, feels more like kindred spirits on the same path.
The Montana / Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter has always long been one for dwelling in a pseudo-dark and moody indie rock world; in premiering her debut EP Big Bunny in 2020, Atwood Magazine praised Reid for creating a “raw, hauntingly vulnerable, and emotionally cathartic listening experience for all,” further declaring her one of our generation’s finest artists.
I stand by those words: Big Bunny remains a stunningly visceral and beautifully intimate reckoning two years later, and if “Back to This” is any sign of what’s to come (and I’m sure it is), then Disenchanter promises to be yet another musical masterpiece. Ethereal and atmospheric, observational and reflective, the new song is something of a daydream come to life that finds Reid half-singing, half-breathing her words against a brooding backdrop of glistening guitars, shimmering synths, and cool percussion.
Reid explains how the song came from a hike in the Absaroka-Beartooth, Wilderness, where she saw a group of forest service workers on a break: “It was late summer and they looked happy and dusty,” she recalls. “It was like a painted reverie from a classical painting. I fantasize about other people’s lives, other people’s professions, and writing is a way I can approximate what it must be like to be someone else. So this song is about stumbling upon a scene in someone else’s life and wanting to be a part of it, but it’s also about wondering if I ever seemed as cool or as worthy as those smokejumpers did. I also had this idea of looking back at a photo and wondering why, at the time, I did not feel like the version of myself looking back in the photo.”
Fantasy and reality blend into one as Reid weaves a world of action, emotion, and intent for these characters. “Will you and I be as beautiful years later in this sweaty photograph?” she sings, “As they looked to me that day in the forest, with my head in the slipstream, my heart beating fast.” Like reading your favorite novel, Alaska Reid’s poetry and prose are hypnotic, mesmerizing, and forever welcoming.
Her landscape – the landscape of “Back to This” – is one we can come back to not only for entertainment, but also for comfort and catharsis. It’s an instantly familiar and warm space – immersive, indulgent, intimate, and intoxicating – and therein lies the genius of Alaska Reid. “Running through these dreams, I want to go back to this. “Come with me,” she beckons us closer. “I can’t live if we don’t take chances.”
Take a chance on this song and on Alaska Reid, truly one of our generation’s best.
In the moss around the creek
I saw some smoke jumpers all in their twenties
Dust in their hair, sun on their skin,
Kiss away the boredom till the fires begin
Will you and I be as beautiful years later
in this sweaty photograph
As they looked to me that day in the forest
With my head in the slipstream
My heart beating fast
Running through these dreams
I want to go back to this
Come with me
I can’t live if we don’t take chances
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Stream: “Back to This” – Alaska Reid
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© Audrey Hall
© Audrey Hall
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