Odetta Hartman – Restoration
New York singer-songwriter, Odetta Hartman has shared her new EP, Restoration which arrives with a music video for the track, “Do Si Do”. The EP – out via Transgressive – lands just before a show as part of the label’s 20th anniversary celebration taking place at Baby’s All Right, Brooklyn (alongside The Antlers, MICHELLE, Mutual Benefit, Julien Chang and Mykki Blanco) on September 25.
Swooping off the back of swansongs, a full length album exploring oppositional truths through the sonic lens of digital synthesis, the Restoration EP was born. “In contrast to the lavishly electronic arrangements of my collaboration with Alex Friedman and Wyatt Bertz,” explains Hartman, “the songs on this “little sister” project offer an acoustic alternative, a demure return to my instrumental roots. Schmaltzy strings and stripped back vocals take center stage, embellished by co-producer Lorenzo Wolff’s entire kit-and-caboodle. The emphasis is lyrical, inspired by the classic country adage: three chords and the truth.”
When discussing the EP’s focus track, “Do Si Do”, Odetta says: “Do Si Do depicts the choreography of conflict: a dizzying prance of back-to-back squabbling, set against the backdrop of a psychedelic square dance. Mirroring the theme of evil twins on swansongs, tension builds over a fast-picked banjo until the inner demon dynamite explodes at the end of her rope. An exercise in repression & release, the song’s raging spirit regains its composure for a final spin towards reclamation & restoration – perfectly turned around.”
“The music video for Do Si Do – directed by Tristan Martinez – features the polyvalent voices of a lovelorn protagonist represented by spiraling spectral reflections and decorated in metallic motifs. Handmade by Elise Wunderlich, my grandmother’s blazer is bedazzled with iconography extrapolated from Max Simon’s custom crown, featured on the swansongs album cover. Twirling in a twinkling void, the layered imagery evokes a claustrophobic purgatory masked as a dreamscape disco dance floor.”
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