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Mar 05, 2019 Glen Hansard By Christopher Roberts

Glen Hansard is releasing a new album, This Wild Willing, on April 12 via ANTI-. Previously he shared its first single, “I’ll Be You, Be Me,” which was one of our Songs of the Week. Now he has shared another song from the album, the six-minute long “Fool’s Game.” It starts off brooding and atmospheric and then just explodes with euphoria midway through, before settling back down again. Listen below, followed by Hansard’s upcoming tour dates. La Blogothèque also recently produced a documentary on Hansard shot in Paris that featured Hansard performing two additional songs from the album: “Don’t Settle” and “Race to the Bottom.” Watch that below too.

Hansard had this to say about “Fool’s Game” in a press release: “This song originated with a line I’d been rolling round my head: ‘It’s a fool’s, fool’s game, lover, that we have to play.’ I wanted to build something that felt like The Shangri-Las or Velvet Underground in their ‘Pale Blue Eyes’-period.”

This Wild Willing was “conceived in Paris” and recorded at Black Box studios with producer David Odlum. The album also features classically-trained Iranian musicians the Khoshravesh brothers, long-time Hansard associates Joe Doyle (bass) and ROMY (piano, vocals, string arrangements), and Dublin electronic musicians Deasy and Dunk Murphy (Sunken Foal). Hansard, of course, is also in The Frames and The Swell Season and, alongside Markéta Irglová, won an Academy Award for Best Song for “Falling Slowly” from the film Once that Hansard and Irglová both starred in.

Hansard had this to say about the album in a previous press release: “This collection of songs is mainly made up of those that came through while improvising and following the melodic lines and threads. Sometimes when you take a small musical fragment and you care for it, follow it and build it up slowly, it can become a thing of wonder.”

Glen Hansard Tour Dates:

3/7 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Koninklijk Theater Carré
3/8 - Hamburg, Germany - Elbphilharmonie Hamburg
3/21 - New York, NY - Michael Dorf Presents The Music of Van Morrison
3/22 - New York, NY - The Strand Presents Glen Hansard In Conversation w/ Alan Light
3/29 - Pelham, TN - PBS Bluegrass Underground Live Tapings at the Caverns
4/9 - Dublin, Ireland - Vicar Street
4/10 - Dublin, Ireland - Vicar Street
4/12 - Derry, United Kingdom - St. Columb’s Hall
4/13 - Derry, United Kingdom - St. Columb’s Hall
4/15 - London, United Kingdom - Barbican Centre
4/16 - London, United Kingdom - Barbican Centre
4/27 - Paris, France - Casino de Paris
4/29 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Koninklijk Theater Carré
4/30 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Koninklijk Theater Carré
5/2 - Kobenhavn, Denmark - Amager Bio / BETA
5/4 - Stockholm, Sweden - Skandiascenen
5/6 - Brussels, Belgium - Cirque Royal
5/8 - Cologne, Germany - Kőlner Philharmonie
5/9 - Frankfurt Am Main, Germany - Alte Oper
5/11 - Brno-žabovřesky, Czech Republic - 5th Anniversary of SONO Centrum
5/13 - Warszawa, Poland - Palladium
5/14 - Warszawa, Poland - Palladium
5/16 - Berlin, Germany - Admiralspalast
5/17 - Berlin, Germany - Admiralspalast
5/19 - Berlin, Germany - Admiralspalast
5/29 - Boston, MA - Orpheum Theatre
5/31 - Philadelphia, PA - Merriam Theater
6/1 - New York, NY - Beacon Theatre
6/3 - Washington DC - Lincoln Theatre

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