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Apr 08, 2021 By Joey Arnone Photography by Adelle Barlow

Lou Barlow (Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh, Folk Implosion) has announced a new album titled Reason to Live, which will be out on May 28 via Joyful Noise. Barlow has also shared a video for a new song from the album, “Over You.” Check it out below.

Barlow speaks about the creation of the song and video in a press release: “‘Over You’ is based on one melody and lyric fragment I captured on cassette back in 1982 or so. In 2019, I decided to resurrect and expand this nugget for my ‘Artist Enabler Series’ for Joyful Noise. I used some of the original lyrics: ‘I knew everything about you. I knew nothing about you’ and built on that feeling, the phrase ‘over you’ became the chorus. I recorded the basic tracks for the new version onto cassette in an attempt to mimic the atmosphere of the original.”

He adds: “When considering the video I talked to my wife, Adelle, about things in our lives that we’ve never been ‘over.’ We moved from California six years ago, a place that we both loved. We started compiling home videos from our times living there (17 years in my case) and scenes from some ’80s movies that were filmed in LA. When we combined the footage it seemed to work with the song. I can’t say that I was thinking about anything specifically when I recorded ‘Over You,’ it came from the general longing of my teenage years, but I can definitely say I miss the golden state.”

“This album is me really opening up, and the album follows that through its many different themes,” he states, regarding Reason to Live. “Some of my other work could be almost claustrophobic in its insistence on being all tied together but there’s space for people to live inside these songs. People have this vision of me as this heartbroken, depressed guy, but this record feels so true to who I am, to this rich life I now have full of people I love. The songs culminated over the last five years to show that music has returned to its central comforting role in my life. Now I’m home.”

Dinosaur Jr.’s new album, Sweep It Into Space, will be out on April 23 via Jagjaguwar.

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