Following the 2017 release of Plastic Cough, Great Grandpa were a unit, they lived together, worked together, and toured tirelessly across the country. As tours ended and band members relocated across the US, they found themselves suddenly separated and eventually isolated. The time spent apart wasn’t planned, but it proved to be necessary. It was a chance to gain perspective into their lives, relationships, and creative purpose.
Thus enters Four of Arrows, a creative turn toward introspection and Great Grandpa’s collective result of rest and solitude. Undoubtedly, the 11 songs comprising Four of Arrows are a departure from the playful nods to pizza and zombies on Plastic Cough. The writing and recording process had evolved — less Seattle garage jams and more vulnerable solo songwriting sessions. Most of the songs on Four of Arrows were written in isolation by Patrick and Carrie Goodwin while traveling and living in the Midwest. Though written separately, the songs came to life when the band reunified and began recording with producer Mike Vernon Davis (Modest Mouse, Portugal. The Man) on New Year’s Day in 2019.
The songs weave through the pains of familial divisions, partnership, internal and external forgiveness, and the struggles of mental illness. Pat Goodwin describes “Digger” as the emotional pillar of the album. The lyrics allude to the titular tarot cards and set the scene for Four of Arrows — solitude and an exploration of the obsessive, neurotic and even paranoid existential questioning seen in ourselves and the characters in our lives. “Shouldn’t go out in the darkness” repeated over tranquil guitar, serves as the mantra of the song before it erupts into an evocative and tense outro.
Thankfully, Great Grandpa go headfirst into the darkness and escape from the other side with their most transparent and accomplished work to date. Though the content remains heavy, the bright poppy arrangements of “Mono No Aware” and “Bloom” serve as an unreliable light amongst the dark. “Mono No Aware” a wistful ode to loss of innocence, impermanence, and more explicitly “the pathos of things” combines starry synths and polished harmonies that when paired feel like floating. “Bloom,” the seemingly most hopeful track on the record, shines with conversational charm and demanding hooks (“When I think about Tom Petty, and how he wrote his best songs when he was 39”), before dramatically shedding the façade to reveal it's melancholic heart in a grandiose, Phil Spector-esque outro.
Leaving it to the cards, Great Grandpa used their time off to grow, and their time together to reunify. Their collaborative approach cultivated a musical backdrop for their shared emotions and Four of Arrows is a testament to themselves and their ability to adapt.
Great Grandpa's anxiously awaited sophomore full-length Four of Arrows, is out today! Alight with expansive instrumentation and vulnerable lyrical contemplations of one's life course, the record was born from a turn of creative introspection as the band found themselves isolated after relocating to different states following their 2017 release, Plastic Cough. Realized in bursting, expressive technicolor Four of Arrows marks an exciting sonic and emotional turning point for Great Grandpa. Be sure to catch the band on tour this fall on dates with Vivian Girls, Dump Him, Trace Mountains and more!
“…it’s clear from the start that Four Of Arrows is a massive level-up. You get the sense that this is the band that Great Grandpa have always wanted to be” - Stereogum naming it the Album of The Week
“Impressionistic, emotionally exhaustive, and delivered through a stream of lush harmonies, it takes the terrestrial promise of their debut and throws it into the cosmos” - The FADER
Listen on:
Spotify
Upcoming Tour Dates:
10/25 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
10/26 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
11/3 - Washington, DC @ Songbyrd w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/4 - Philadelphia, PA @ Everybody Hits w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/5 - Brooklyn, NY @ Elsewhere: Zone One w/ Dump Him, Trace Mountains
11/6 - Boston, MA @ ONCE Ballroom w/ Dump Him, Really From
11/16 - Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey (Album Release)
Find tickets on our tour page!
Today Great Grandpa shares "Bloom," the last single until their sophomore LP Four of Arrows is released on October 25th. In conversation with NYLON, Patrick Goodwin shared some of their songwriting goals for the tune - “the first being to write a song for [bassist] Carrie [Goodwin] that combined many of her favorite genres/artists—’90s pop-country, Tom Petty, Third Eye Blind, Taylor Swift, the Beatles, etc.—into something cohesive. The second being to capture this elusive spirit present in many of Petty’s great songs, where the underlying melancholy emotion is gilded or masked by joyful melodies and arrangements then slowly revealed in the lyrics.”
"an anthem for your inner underdog" - NYLON
"the Seattle band are seriously leveling up...the song is everything that this new version of Great Grandpa do so well, mixing sharp pop sensibilities with rootsy, emo-tinged indie rock" - Stereogum
Listen on:
Spotify
Apple Music
Bandcamp
Swamp Green w/ Olive Splatter Vinyl (ltd 250)
Upcoming Tour Dates:
10/5 - Santa Ana, CA @ The Observatory w/ Vivian Girls
10/6 - San Diego, CA @ The Observatory North Park w/ Vivian Girls
10/25 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
10/26 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
11/3 - Washington, DC @ Songbyrd w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/4 - Philadelphia, PA @ Everybody Hits w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/5 - Brooklyn, NY @ Elsewhere: Zone One w/ Dump Him, Trace Mountains
11/6 - Boston, MA @ ONCE Ballroom w/ Dump Him, Really From
11/16 - Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey (Album Release)
Find tickets on our tour page!
Great Grandpa share second single "Digger" and an accompanying video from their upcoming LP Four of Arrows, out October 25th. Deemed "a five-minute burst of splendour that might well be the band’s most captivating moment to-date" by Gold Flake Paint, "Digger" explores the internal state of unrest caused when one becomes consumed by unhealthy thought patterns.
"Covering an expansive sonic range that includes indie-folk, bombastic garage-rock, and serene chamber-pop, “Digger” is an enthralling ballad that hits stratospheric emotional heights."
— Impose Magazine
Swamp Green w/ Olive Splatter Vinyl (ltd 250)
Upcoming Tour Dates:
10/4 - Los Angeles, CA @ The Regent Theatre w/ Vivian Girls
10/5 - Santa Ana, CA @ The Observatory w/ Vivian Girls
10/6 - San Diego, CA @ The Observatory North Park w/ Vivian Girls
10/25 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
10/26 - San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel w/ Vivian Girls
11/3 - Washington, DC @ Songbyrd w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/4 - Philadelphia, PA @ Everybody Hits w/ Dump Him, Merce Lemon
11/5 - Brooklyn, NY @ Elsewhere: Zone One w/ Dump Him, Trace Mountains
11/6 - Boston, MA @ ONCE Ballroom w/ Dump Him, Really From
11/16 - Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey (Album Release)
Find tickets on our tour page!
