Until this morning I did not think I liked Bartees Strange. I did not care at all for the single that I heard off his previous album, so I never listened to anymore of his music. The first single, “Heavy Heart”, off his new album, Farm to Table, that came out today was something I liked better but still wasn’t anything that made me think wow I was completely wrong about how I feel about this artist’s music and I should really check out his other stuff. Well, now I am here to tell you that I was wrong about Bartees Strange because I really adore this new album. I still haven’t had a chance now to go actually listen to his full album to see if I like it as well, but I will. So thank you to NPR Music for playing a clip from “Mulholland Dr.” on your New Music Friday podcast this morning and alerting me to the fact that I might be missing out on something.

Bartees Strange is an interesting guy. He grew up in Oklahoma. He played football, but his mom was an opera singer so he also went to opera camp. He worked for the Obama administration as a spokesman for the FCC. He eventually quit that job and moved to New York to have a job that would give him more time to play music on the side and then eventually gave in and made music a full time gig. It was obviously a good move for him and for music lovers. I obviously can’t compare this to the first album that I haven’t fully listened to yet, but he for sure does not have a sophomore slump on his hands with this new album.

“Mulholland Dr.” is not my favorite song from the new album, but since it is the song that finally made me sit up and take notice, it is the one I’m sharing here. The sort of twinkly keyboardy sounds near the beginning of the song totally remind me of “I Don’t Live Here Anymore” by The War on Drugs. For all I know they’re both using the same loop. I don’t know because I don’t actually know anything about music, I just really like it. Sounds very similar if not the same to me. It’s what first drew me into the song because I’ve already shared how much I adore “I Don’t Live Here Anymore”. I’m very glad I finally got out of my own way and gave Bartees Strange a chance.