Peter Oren - The Greener Pasture

New album from singer-songwriter Peter Oren out 24th April from Western Vinyl

FFO: Eerie Gaits, Bon Iver, Rayland Baxter, Bob Mould

His first new release since 2017's Anthropocene, Oren has recorded this album himself in his hometown of Nashville, Indiana. This is the first project he has mixed, mastered and produced himself and recorded mostly in seclusion at a cabin near his hometown surrounded by hilly and wooded acres totally 60.

The album involved him trading files with fellow musicians some he has never met in person, yet he has produced an album that is at both times about connecting in this large world, and in these unsettling times of pandemic that theme of unity and togetherness is even more telling.

Highly rooted in the history of Americana roots, blues and country and western, while it is indebted to that rich history of American musical genres, Oren is writing about prevelant first world problems so not tales of backwater gangs but as in 'Ones and Ohs' it is about excessive phone usage and becoming a slave to this modern technology at your fingertips.

'Fun Yet' (track 6 on the album) concerns the need to have fun despite all the ability at those same fingerprints. 'John Wayne' is about the search for heroes and icons in these times of trouble. So this album is as much about looking forwards as looking back in its stripped down woozy wonderfulness.

Opening single 'Gnawed to The Bone (Come By)' is about feeling isolation understandable when recording in isolation and the theme coming through the album is about Oren combating this period of isolation and having to overcome those fears of vulnerability and gain a voice amongst the chaos and loneliness.

That first single was released on 19th February, here we are two months later and the world is very much different to then. We are all coming together in periods of reflection and contemplation, and it is works like this that will help us do this - becoming a voice for the people who themselves are seeking answers amongst this weird dystopia we find ourselves living in.

The Greener Pasture is a rich work of individualism for the people, it is out on all platforms from 24th April from Western Vinyl.