Wendy Eisenberg – Old Myth Dying

Following the announcement of their highly anticipated self-titled album, due April 3 via Joyful Noise, Brooklyn-based songwriter, improviser, and virtuoso guitarist Wendy Eisenberg today shares “Old Myth Dying.”

The track offers another glimpse into Eisenberg’s poetic, daring new album—one that foregrounds their folk sensibilities and marks a new creative milestone after a decade of genre-spanning work.

On the new single, Eisenberg sings in a fevered register over polyrhythmic guitar playing. “I wrote Old Myth Dying in early 2024 during an insane fever. Although I knew I should have been trying to sleep it off, I wanted to see if I could do this polyrhythm in my right hand and sing over it. Historically, practicing has allowed me to forget that I have a body that feels pain – I disappear into the action, in pursuit of becoming beauty. This time, my lyrics came out straightforward and wary, blunter than usual. They revealed a different pain I was feeling, the pain of actually knowing what you can and can’t control, and what inherited myths have been lies designed to control you all along.”

The preview follows the album announcement single “Meaning Business,” which garnered early praise from Hearing Things, Stereogum, The Needle Drop, The Guardian, and others, with Paste recently including them on their list of the “75 Greatest Guitarists of the 21st Century.”

The songs on Wendy Eisenberg began to take root in 2020, when Eisenberg moved from Western Massachusetts to Brooklyn. Longing for pastoral sounds, they gravitated toward classic songwriting practitioners like John Hartford, Gillian Welch, and John Prine; “weirdo country interpreters” like Richard Dawson and Joanna Newsom; and pop-folk orchestrations from Judee Sill, Jimmy Webb, and Van Dyke Parks. “The production is less about seeing what the guitar might be capable of and more accepting the inherent strangeness of the languages it has spoken for the last century and a half,” Eisenberg says.

A personal reckoning between 2023 and 2024, a period of self-confrontation they liken to a personal exorcism, imbued Eisenberg’s new music with sturdiness, clarity, conviction, and beauty. “I had this weird, semi-mystical experience,” Eisenberg says. “I remember walking around for hours alone, having given up on some kind of straight love, straight performance. Much of what I thought I wanted felt totally irrelevant. The part of me that felt like I had to be legible to appease imaginary people finally needed to die.”

On Wendy Eisenberg, the artist works with longtime collaborators—including bassist Trevor Dunn, drummer Ryan Sawyer, and co-producer Mari Rubio, who handled pedal steel, synth, and string arrangements. “I was finally around people who accepted me,” Eisenberg says. “Many of the songs on this record were written in that new feeling. I wanted it to be incredibly comforting as it describes some massive changes in self-understanding. It’s about relief.”

Eisenberg’s life has steadied since that period. They became a full-time assistant professor of songwriting and now live with Rubio, their girlfriend. “These things being true have changed my songwriting voice. It’s just as urgent as always, but slightly more spacious,” they say. “I’d spent my life trying to wrestle things into existence. These are songs that honestly just emerged, miraculously.”

Eisenberg will be performing steadily throughout the year in numerous iterations across solo, duo, and various projects. Their run of dates includes shows with Richard Dawson and a co-headlining album release run with more eaze, with additional dates to be announced soon. Eisenberg’s full tour schedule can be found below.

Listen to “Old Myth Dying,” and stay tuned for more music from Wendy Eisenberg arriving ahead of the full self-titled album release on April 3 via Joyful Noise Recordings.

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