“Raindrop Blue” by King Tuff

King Tuff has released new song off The Other, out April 13th via Sub Pop Records. Along with the announcement, King Tuff has also announced a North American tour beginning May 3rd in San Diego. Cut Worms will open the shows, and all tickets go on sale this Friday, February 9th

Speaking about “Raindrop Blue,” Thomas lays out its relevance to the greater story of the album and its relationship to the previously-released song “The Other”:

“…I took the hand of the Other…you fell onto my fingers like velvet to the touch…
Is Raindrop Blue the lost forgotten lover? Is she the Other? Is she the Blue Subaru?
Funny story about that Blue Subaru…

I wrote “The Other” in October 2016. At the time it was a fictional story about losing myself and the quest to find the creative spirit again. I imagined myself driving around in a 1982 blue Subaru Brat, which has been my dream car ever since I was a little kid. I would see them driving around my hometown, Brattleboro, Vermont, and I thought the name Brat had something to do with the town itself. It always seemed like the unicorn of cars; you’d only catch a glimpse of one when you weren’t looking. So I was driving this car around in my song cuz you can do whatever you want inside a song.

A year and a half later and the album was done. I sent it to my good friend Em so she could take a listen. She’s been in school studying dreams and alchemy, and we talked about the dark side of the moon, the flip side of the mirror, the unknowable Other and things in the lyrics which were oddly in line with her studies. She’s always had the most poetically surreal dreams as long as I’ve known her, full of symbols and strange beauty, like she’s tapped into some kinda psychic conduit. She was in Vermont but her dreams had been telling her to go to New Mexico. She needed transportation for when she got there, so she was hunting around on Craigslist to find some dusty old high-desert gem she could zoom around in. The first car that popped up: “1982 Blue Subaru Brat in Albuquerque.” The exact car from my song. She sent me the ad. I immediately booked a flight out there, bought the car, and drove her back to LA in a blaze of romantic glory.
The lyrics in the song had somehow come true.

It felt like whatever this mysterious “Other” was, it seemed like maybe it was on my side. Helping me along. As long as I had faith in it.

So..is Raindrop Blue the Other? or the Subaru? Probably both and probably neither. But one thing is for certain: I love to dance.”

Thomas self-produced the record and brought in Shawn Everett (War On Drugs, Alabama Shakes) to assist with the mixing process.No less hooky than previous records, the new songs ditch the goofy rock-and-roll bacchanalia narratives of earlier records in favor of expansive arrangements, a diversity of instrumentation, and lyrics that straddle the fence between painful ruminations and reconnecting with that part of yourself that feels childlike and creative and not corroded by cynicism. The record features contributions from Ty Segall (drums), Jenny Lewis (vocals), Greta Morgan (vocals), and Mikal Cronin (saxophone).

Thomas views the entire experience of the record as a kind of psychic reset. “I let the songs lead me where they wanted to go, instead of trying to push them into a certain zone. King Tuff was always just supposed to be me. When I started doing this as a teenager, it was whatever I wanted it to be. King Tuff was never supposed to be just one thing. It was supposed to be everything.”

KING TUFF
THE OTHER
SUB POP
APRIL 13, 2018

1. The Other
2. Raindrop Blue
3. Thru The Cracks
4. Psycho Star
5. Infinite Mile
6. Birds of Paradise
7. Circuits in the Sand
8. Ultraviolet
9. Neverending Sunshine
10. No Man’s Land

King Tuff on tour:
May 3 – San Diego, CA – The Casbah *
May 4 – Phoenix, AZ – Valley Bar *
May 5 – Santa Fe, NM – Meow Wolf *
May 7 – Houston, TX – Rockefeller Hall *
May 8 – Austin, TX – Barracuda (outside) *
May 9 – Dallas, TX – Club Dada *
May 11 – New Orleans, LA – One Eyed Jacks *
May 12 – Atlanta, GA – The Earl *
May 13 – Nashville TN – The Basement East *
May 14 – Lexington, KY – The Burl *
May 16 – Washington DC – Rock & Roll Hotel *
May 18 – Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg *
May 19 – Philadelphia, PA – First Unitarian Church *
May 20 – Boston, MA – Brighton Music Hall *
May 22 – Burlington, VT – Higher Ground *
May 23 – Toronto, ON – Horseshoe Tavern *
May 24 – Detroit, MI – El Club *
May 25 – Chicago, IL – Lincoln Hall *
May 26 – Minneapolis, MN – Turf Club *
May 29 – Denver, CO – Globe Hall *
May 30 – Salt Lake City, UT – Urban Lounge *
June 1 – Seattle, WA – The Crocodile *
June 2 – Vancouver, BC – Fortune Sound Club *
June 3 – Portland, OR – Star Theater *
June 5 – San Francisco, CA – The Independent *
June 7 – Los Angeles, CA – Teragram Ballroom *

* w/ Cut Worms

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