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Apr 20, 2021 By Mark Redfern

Hiss Golden Messenger (the project of M.C. Taylor) is releasing a new album, Quietly Blowing It, on June 25 via Merge. Now he has shared another song from it, “Hardytown,” via a Dylan-esque video for the song, where Taylor has the lyrics written on cue cards. Watch the KidEthnic-directed video below.

Taylor had this to say about the song in a press release: “The times that we’re living through have made me think, in so many different ways large and small, about our obligations to one another. How much to give away? How much to keep for ourselves? How much is too much, and how much is not enough? Maybe the conversation that the mother and son have throughout ‘Hardlytown’ was my attempt to reckon with the tension that exists between selflessness and selfishness…. We all know some version of this conversation. We’re currently in the middle of it as a country and as a species. I have two children, and I’m trying to teach them about what it means to be, and the ways we all stand to benefit from being, good neighbors. It’s sort of a simple lesson in theory, but more complicated in practice. But then, I guess all good things are.”

When the album was announced, Taylor shared a new song from it, “If It Comes in the Morning,” via a video for the single. The album also features “Sanctuary,” a new song Hiss Golden Messenger shared in January.

In the press release Taylor says Quietly Blowing It “feels like the most personal album that I’ve made because I’m not trying to explain anything to anyone except myself.”

Special guests on the album include Griffin and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes, Zach Williams of The Lone Bellow, Nashville guitarist Buddy Miller, and producer/musician Josh Kaufman of Bonny Light Horseman and Muzz.

The band’s most recent album, Terms of Surrender, was released back in 2019 on Merge. The album includes the songs “I Need a Teacher” (which was one of our Songs of the Week) and “Cat’s Eye Blue.”

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