Paper Sky by Ben Weaver

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Modern Folk | Pop Crossover

14 tracks | 47 minutes

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sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 02:14 in november lyrics BUY MP3 02:14 in november lyrics "GIFT MP3" 02:14 in november
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 04:12 wings as knives lyrics FREE 04:12 wings as knives lyrics "GIFT MP3" 04:12 wings as knives
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sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:50 like a vine after the sun lyrics BUY MP3 03:50 like a vine after the sun lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:50 like a vine after the sun
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:06 the un elected lyrics BUY MP3 03:06 the un elected lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:06 the un elected
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:11 black on black lyrics BUY MP3 03:11 black on black lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:11 black on black
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:34 down 25 lyrics BUY MP3 03:34 down 25 lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:34 down 25
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 04:37 surrealism and blues lyrics BUY MP3 04:37 surrealism and blues lyrics "GIFT MP3" 04:37 surrealism and blues
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 04:19 sorrow lyrics BUY MP3 04:19 sorrow lyrics "GIFT MP3" 04:19 sorrow
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sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:32 geisha lyrics BUY MP3 03:32 geisha lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:32 geisha
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:19 rain leaves smoke lyrics BUY MP3 03:19 rain leaves smoke lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:19 rain leaves smoke
sample lyrics "DOWNLOAD" 03:52 whatever you want to haunt you lyrics BUY MP3 03:52 whatever you want to haunt you lyrics "GIFT MP3" 03:52 whatever you want to haunt you

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Editorial review

Only in his twenties at the time of this release, Ben Weaver smacks of such barrel-voiced, existential depressives as Leonard Cohen and Greg Brown. But even at his darkest, and even at the most weary and plodding pace, there is something lulling and wistful about Weaver's muse. "Plastic Bag" plods along on piles of slow tumbling piano notes and Weaver's deep mournful rumble of a voice, but then, suddenly, he swoops to the upper edge of his range and croons prettily and desperately, adding a whole other dimension to the downer trip. "Down 25" uses the same flourishes, tethering Weaver's lost highway/lost love poeticisms to plucked guitar, spare drum whacks, and his alternating rumble and croon. By contrast, "Geisha" is deep, gutbucket Americana, built on scalding guitar and Weaver's apocalyptic snarl. "Wings as Knives" is similarly dark and dire, with low organ groans providing the musical bed instead of guitar. Paper Sky reveals a new, highly poetic and creative songwriter more than ably staking out lonely terrain that has previously been traversed by such iconoclastic Americana troubadours as Brown and Richard Buckner. ~ Erik Hage, All Music Guide

Bio / Background

“I only have one rule when it comes to songwriting. That is: whenever I have an idea I stop whatever I am doing and I write it down.”

So goes the life of Ben Weaver.

And though the Minneapolis-based songwriter spends more time in his basement getting those ideas down than is likely proper or healthy, it’s hard to argue with the results – evocative, hushed songs populated by birds, phone booths, lovers, empty parking lots, friends, shoppers in the checkout line, and plastic bags stuck in trees.

A former Casket Company warehouse is Weaver’s current world headquarters. Multitudinous organs, synthesizers, guitars, a sampler, a piano, a dog, Polaroid cameras, sketch books, New Yorker back issues, boxes of CDs and a PowerBook mark the territory. There is an air of controlled chaos and the musty smell of old tube amps.

This is where, under the watchful eye of a dog and perhaps several hundred interred ghosts, Weaver’s striking new album, Paper Sky, took shape.

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With the aid of committed producer Brian Deck (Modest Mouse, Iron & Wine), the record coalesces into a seamless blend of urban and rural, experimental and roots. “This record explores urban and industrial themes that I hadn’t touched before. I have been living in the city and that has made me see the relationship between the city and field differently.”

Consequently, Weaver’s interest in experimental and electronic music steps to the forefront on Paper Sky, with crinkly synthesizer textures and other mutilated sounds mixed beneath beautiful layers of cello and blasts of processed trumpet. “Deck exposed me to the Austrian laptop performer Fennesz. He was a huge influence for a lot of the sound stage and static feel of this record. But I was also listening to a lot of Bill Evans, Glenn Gould, Silver Jews...”

The Casket Co. warehouse is also home to Ben’s label Fugawee Bird Records. Of running his own label Weaver says, “there was a point where I felt the business was taking away from the music but I began to see how everything was related: the more I focused on things as a whole - music and business - the more things grew together and complimented each other.”

When not writing, recording or releasing his records, Weaver is often on the road, touring through Europe, America and Australia. “I try and change my surroundings as often as I can,” says Weaver, who performs solo and with a revolving cast of collaborators. “This way I am always being exposed to new things that effect and change my interpretation of the world, which leads to a constant renewal in my art.”

Weaver writes continuously, a process perhaps more akin to breathing than composing, and has released a veritable Minnesota blizzard of material – at the age of 26, Paper Sky is his fifth record. So perhaps it’s not a surprise that Weaver has already set to planning the record to follow Paper Sky, which he hopes to release early next year. “I have always identified with those people who make art because they have to, that sense of necessity and urgency. That is why I make art, to fulfill that need within myself and to connect with the people of the world who also cannot live without it.”

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Top tracks

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Other Modern Folk albums

Other Pop Crossover albums

Paper Sky by Ben Weaver

Modern Folk | Pop Crossover

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