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Pale Spring
CYGNUS

1. Silence
2. Happening
3. Belongings
4. Forevermore
5. Carry Me Home
6. Guilt Trip
7. Old Sounds
8. Quarantines




Bandcamp Daily's 7 Essential Releases of the Week by J. Edward Keyes:

"Pale Spring hails from Baltimore, but the music on her haunting new album CYGNUS traces its history to the point in the mid ‘90s where trip-hop was starting to give way to groups like Morcheeba and Lamb, who found artful ways to blend downtempo electronics with serene, soulful singing. There are other touchstones, to be sure—there are scattered moments when Pale Spring, aka Emily Harper Scott, sounds eerily similar to Sade—but the bulk of CYGNUS drifts along on a river of placid synths. The results are hypnotic: on opening track “Silence,” Scott’s voice trips gently down a rickety ladder of percussion; on the elegiac “Forevermore,” she stretches melody lines out in parallel with the twisting ribbons of synth beneath her, making the song feel ghostly and forlorn. Even when she wanders into different, sometimes harsher terrain—as she does on the crackling, bass-heavy closing track “Quaratines”—her voice maintains its delicacy, tenderly exhaling notes rather than overpowering with showy virtuosity. CYGNUS is an enveloping album, one that casts a spell early, and sustains it over the length of its runtime."

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"Doom Trip continues their winning streak with this gorgeous, dreamlike album, where Emily Scott’s vocals swim through rivers of synth."

- Bandcamp New and Notable, May 2019

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"There is an alternate universe where Emily Scott is already a household name, and if there is any justice in the world, our universe will soon catch up with that one.

Pale Spring’s Cygnus might be Doom Trip’s most straight-up pop release yet, but a kind of slanted, dour pop with muted, echoed trip hop production, courtesy of Scott’s husband Drew. Scott comes off in her delivery like Dido, Imogen Heap, or Portishead’s Beth Gibbons. Like its avian subject, the swan — a symbol of beauty and grace — Cygnus demonstrates a dignified sorrow at every step, its bowed head a contemplative symbol of its inner workings. Scott plays the part perfectly, her emotive voice a confident manifestation of bare melancholy and regret displayed for the purposes of entertainment. Our attention is voyeuristic, our intention is empathy.

But then the stars.

The constellation Cygnus is a simple cross shape, recognizable enough that Ptolemy listed it in the second century BCE. Pale Spring’s Cygnus contains a similar emotional nexus, connecting head to heart and mind to body, but tenuously, as fragile a point of reference as the constellation’s imaginary lines. It infiltrates like a frigid winter night, sky brilliant with flickering points, air crisp and sharp. And through it all Emily Scott’s voice radiates like melodicized moonlight.

Is she a household name yet?

How about now?"

- Ryan Masteller, Tiny Mix Tapes, June 2019

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"Hailing from Baltimore, Emily Harper Scott AKA Pale Spring grew up in a family of jazz and classical musicians before finding her musical voice through exploring the region’s punk, hip hop and IDM scenes. Two EPs, collaborations with JPEGMAFIA and Joy Postell, shows with Eartheater, Sam Herring, and Soccer Mommy, and time spent in trauma therapy cleared the way for her lush new album. Now located in Los Angeles, Cygnus locates her within a dusky trip-hop meets quiet storm interzone where she renders her songs as ghostly, hypnotic dreams, a touch of Nite Jewel there, a dash of Portishead there."

- Martyn Pepperell, DAZED, July 2019

released May 31, 2019

All songs performed by Emily Harper Scott
All songs produced by Emily Harper Scott and Drew Scott
All songs written by Emily Harper Scott except Belongings (written by Chris Taylor)
Mixed by Drew Scott
Mastered by Mikey Young
Recorded by Kevin Bernsten at Developing Nations Studio
and by Emily and Drew in Drewcifer's Basement
Additional vocals on Silence by Josh Stokes
Additional guitar on Belongings and Old Sounds by Christ Taylor
Bass on Belongings by Kevin Bernsten
Photography by Danny Siebenhaar

© 2019 Pale Spring | All Rights Reserved