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about
Blue House are James Howard, Ursula Russell and Dimitrios “Dimi the Greek” Ntontis. Stay With Me is the first look at the new album scheduled for release in March 2019. Built around the searchingly honest and anxious text of poet and performer Toby Thompson and features whole-tone sax from Alabaster dePlume. The words, like the album as a whole, turn over stones, finding weird Britain in all kinds of poses and postures underneath.
About the track, James says: “I met Toby Thompson when we were both asked to be in a short film last year. All I had to do was stand in a high window smoking cigarette after cigarette trying not to fall onto the Crossrail site five floors below; his job was to pretend to be asleep in a bed beneath my window. Unsurprisingly this left some room for conversation, and he narrated an entire Herman Hesse fairytale for me, which was hypnotic (and incredibly dangerous on account of the sheer drop to my left). I asked him to contribute something to the album and Stay With Me is the result. I was happy with the music but couldn’t figure out the vocal role. Toby wrote this poem for it and I love the way it rambles.”
Toby Thompson is a poet and theatre practitioner, whose most recent work at the Battersea Arts Centre was based on the Hesse fairytale mentioned above. He has worked with the RSC, the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company and appeared at numerous U.K. festivals. He has been described by Kate Tempest as “the future.”
Blue House play the Lexington in London on 29/03/2019
lyrics
I had a dream where I hosted a party in my grandma’s garden
And you brought Sade and said it was her birthday
And so I snuck off to a quiet place and made her a card
And then I came back and said, hey, Sade, I made you this card
And she looked at me askance, and I became flustered
And afterwards you told me you’d made a mistake, and it wasn’t her birthday
And that’s when I decided to never forgive you and woke up blushing and shivering and sweating
I have forgiven you though, I could probably forgive you for anything
How are you? I’m sorry I haven’t written
Is Beelzebub well? I hope she’s not shivering too much
Maybe you should get her a jacket
I recently saw a great dane on the tube
It had a polka dot handkerchief tied round its neck
White spots on red, the same as your pyjamas
Is the winter sun shining where you are?
It’s snowing in London, the shops are all closed
And the parks are full of angels
I took a personality test on the weekend
Apparently I’m more conscientious than approximately 2 of every hundred people
On the other hand, I’m exceedingly agreeable and not at all neurotic
You know a while ago I found a dead bird in my garden
I made it a shrine from a bent stick that looked like a cross and some pine cones
Remember when we buried Lucifer the rabbit? My how the time’s flown
I wanted to sing shalom like we did
But I couldn’t for the life of me remember how it goes
So I just said the word, shalom, a few times as resonantly as possible
I’ve been learning My Ideal on the piano, you know that Chet Baker one I always hum
Will I ever find the girl in my mind, the one who is my ideal
I'm also learning Night In Tunisia and Rocky Racoon
I’ll send you a voice memo of one of them soon
Hugh Masekela died, did you hear?
I couldn’t quite shed a tear, when I tried to it just made think
How I’ve never grieved anyone I saw more than 4 or 5 times in a year
Sometimes I worry that the universe is storing up tragedies for me
On a lighter note
I just remembered how your dad though that Erykah Badu was called Ereeky Mabooboo
Still cracks me up
I think perhaps I have feelings for you
Unrequitable feelings
Okay I’m gonna go and throw this letter in the bin now
After one or two embarrassed readings
credits
released December 14, 2018
Performers: Toby Thompson,
James Howard, Ursula Russell, Dimitrios Ntontis, David Miller, Jacob Smedegaard, Alabaster Deplume, Wasil Shavek.
Words: Toby Thompson
Music: James Howard
Produced by Blue House and Capitol K
Mixed by Capitol K
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