Description
Label Review.
2019 album also available on Vinyl.
Our Overview.
Los Angeles based singer - songwriter is releasing her new album ‘Wake Up Again’ on Yep Roc Records. And the new LP was inspired by her experience teaching songwriting at two Southern Californian womens prisons and is a set of compelling personalised musical portraits and vignettes.
“Some songs were written there, while I was teaching and participating in the assignments that I gave,” says Mandell, “others are portraits or amalgamations of two or more inmates or were inspired by something I heard them say.” says Eleni.
The track - and newly released single - ‘Circumstance was inspired by two different women. Neither accepted responsibility for what lead to their incarceration. One said she recounts, “it just happened.” The other woman claimed that it was all her boyfriend’s fault. The word ‘circumstance’ comes from ‘around’ and ‘stand’, which I thought applied so well to life in prison, which requires a lot of standing around.”
For nearly two years, through Jail With Guitars the organisation founded by MC5’s Wayne Kramer and Billy Bragg, and the William James Association, Mandell says she “loved working with the inmates, hearing their stories and seeing them light up when they heard their words come to life in a song.”
From the dark, dreamy “Circumstance” to the noisy “Be Together”, and the jagged brutality of “Whats Your Handle”, the album highlights Elenis strengths as a writer and performer going back to her start under the tutelage of Chuck E. Weiss, Tom Waits and other top chroniclers of people in the shadows. ‘Wake Up Again’ is a probing look into the lives and minds, the regrets and hopes of those she met, but ultimately also of her and us.
Produced by Sheldon Gomberg at his Silver Lake studio, the album features 11 original compositions with Mandell on vocals and acoustic guitar, Milo Jones (guitar), Ryan Feves (bass), and Kevin Fitzgerald (drums).
Since her 1999 debut album Wishbone, she has released Thrill (2000), Snakebite (2001), Country for True Lovers (2003), Afternoon (2004), Miracle of Five (2007), Artificial Fire (2009), I Can See The Future (2012), Let’s Fly A Kite (2014), Dark Lights Up (2015. She is also a member of the indie folk supergroup The Living Sisters with Inara George and Becky Stark.