Whether you know her band, Shivaree, or not, you’re likely familiar with their work and the voice of former vocalist, Ambrosia Parsley. In the late nineties to mid-aughts, the rootsy Americana group was tapped for soundtracks to the small and big screen alike and could be heard in everything from teen television melodrama to Tarantino films and even appeared on the Silver Linings Playbook after the band’s 2007 separation.

Nearly a decade later, the dusky vocals of Parsley are making a reappearance on her debut solo album, Weeping Cherry, out next week. The album follows well in the footsteps of her full band, exploring the more serious, somber edges of American roots rock, blues, and jazz-infused pop with Parsley’s distinctive, alluring vocals lighting the way from start to finish.

We got a chance to check in with Ambrosia leading up to the album release and a string of shows to follow to talk about her time away form the industry, making time for family, and the origins of the new album.

Read on as you listen to the slow, darkly jazzy number “Make Me Laugh” off the new album.

raven + crow: Alright, first off, thanks for taking some time to talk with us, Ambrosia. And congratulations on the album—I know it’s been a long time coming, so it must feel good to be able to share it.

So, the album title, Weeping Cherry, comes from a really beautiful track about halfway through the album. It almost reminds me of old Cowboy Junkies. Can you tell me why you chose that as the title track and how it speaks to the larger piece of work?

Ambrosia Parsley: Well, I’d read somewhere that kamikaze pilots sometimes painted pictures of cherry blossoms on their planes. Many songs on this record speak directly to some dead friends of mine who were sort of like kamikazes. There’s also a big weeping cherry at the bottom of my road. I’m pretty much lousy with reasons.

Sounds reasonable enough to me. Your music—and that of your old band, Shivaree—definitely has a kind of retro, classic feel. Are you a particularly big fan of early doo-wop, blues and the like or do you just tend to write music that fits that genre well?

Exactly.

What was it like recording a solo album compared to your collaborative work with Shivaree?

You think I made all that noise by myself? We had a lovely time and I collaborated frequently and vigorously with The Elegant Too (Chris Maxwell & Phil Hernandez). Also this time around again for Danny McGough, Joan Wasser & AA Bondy, all of whom have Shivaree’d in the past. Any day spent with the aforementioned is a beautiful and very lucky one.

This album was initially released in France last year, correct?

Oui.

How did that come about and why there before the States?

Seemed like a great idea at the time. And it was really nice get to come home, rest up and reboot for a year and a half after a grueling nine day tour.

Hah. I think it was originally announced that you were going to release your first solo album a year or so after Shivaree broke up, in 2008 or so, but that never came to fruition. Is this that album? Meaning, if you had released the album six years back, would have a similar sound; similar songs?

I don’t remember announcing anything, but if If i did, I was probably just guessing/talking smack. Wow, that is a really excellent question and I’m afraid we’ll never know. Fingerprints or fashion….hmmm…

Fair enough. Was the reason you didn’t release the album earlier more industry-related or more personal? I know you relocated upstate and now have a son. Did it just seem like a good time in your life to step away from that part of your life for a bit?

Personal of course! Anyone can put out a record if they want to. I never saw the urgency there. You do when you do. Mothering is for real. You have to do it just then. Very urgent. They can’t even stand up for christ sakes! One needs to really concentrate on for a while ( forever?) and I really enjoy that deliverance from myself, but I never stopped writing, or singing. I just stopped riding around in a van.

Most would agree that’s the least fun part of the whole thing anyway. Why now though, for the new album? It seems easy to just leave that part of your life behind for good—is it just something that’s in your bones, writing music; singing?

I guess I can’t help myself. And barbering is a hard road.

So my barber tells me. How do you like it, the “settled down” life of a parent in what I’m assuming is a slower pace of life in the Catskills? Do you miss the city life much?

I don’t find anything about being a parent to be remotely settling. We’re in the city most of the time for a couple of years now, but try to find time for it all….that’s the challenge, right?

So I’m told. I have enough trouble managing myself; I can’t imagine throwing a kid in the mix. Now, I know you had maybe more your fair share of trials + tribulations with the industry while in your old band, but, in Shivaree, you also saw first-hand this massive shift in the music industry brought on by the prevalence of online activity from your band’s founding to its slpit. Any thoughts on how the industry has changed since you first started making music?

Yeah, we sort of hopped an elevator to the top and then immediately got booted out of an 80th floor window. There was a lot of sushi and parties on the way down. Nuts in first class…that was the best. Now? Now we’re spray painting on walls, heaven help us. Though my dad would say, “at least you have walls”.

Wise father, I’d say. I know your playing a couple shows at Rockwood Music Hall in NYC, but any plans for a tour any time soon?

Yes, starting May 14th. Come say hello.

Will do! Thanks for talking with us and best of luck on with the new album.

Ambrosia plays a record release party in NYC at Rockwood on May 14th; check her Facebook page for more dates and pre-order and preview the album, Weeping Cherry, out April 28th via Barbés Records, also available through iTunes.

Yesterday, I finished one of the weirdest trio of modern books I’ve ever read.

Bound up in this handsomely designed anthology, Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy compiles sci-fi writer Jeff VanderMeer‘s 2014 novels Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance. As Joshua Rothman puts it in his review for The New Yorker:

“Broadly speaking, the novels, Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance, are eco-sci-fi: they’re about researchers exploring a mysterious, deadly, and unaccountable wilderness called Area X. But they’re also experiments in psychedelic nature writing, in the tradition of Thoreau, and meditations on the theme of epistemic pessimism, in the tradition of Kafka.”

Rothman goes on to admire VanderMeer’s ability to keep the reader on his or her toes, avoiding the common pitfall of speculative fiction of, once arriving at the crux of the fictive/sci-fi element, becoming predictable and/or trite.

But through each of these three novels, as soon as you feel you’ve got something figured out, the author flips the story on its head, adding some other, larger element that encompasses what you thought you knew in a newly complex way, switching narrative perspective, and, in general, keeping the story-telling excitingly ahead of the imagination of the reader…in my case, at least.

At times, it left me wheeling and kind of clueless, but it never left me bored. And even if I had some problems with Area X as a literary series, the fact that Paramount Pictures has bought the rights to produce all three books (with Ex Machina + 28 Days Later writer Alex Garland set to direct the first film) has me excited about the story’s translation to the big screen. Done well, it’ll be sure to be a visually stunning thriller that, likewise, keeps its audience excitedly on its toes.

Plus neon Pantone printing, man. Best.

Jacket design by Rodrigo Corral + Tyler Comrie.

It’s Burger Week, I’m told, so what better time to discuss the marvel of Beyond Meat‘s new Beastly Sliders.

We’d opined on the Bill Gates-backed Los Angeles company’s original product, the Chicken-Free Strips, a couple years back, essentially stating that we thought they were pretty convincing and a great alternative to have on the market, but not something that we really saw ourselves seeking out much. These sliders, though—they are right up our alley.

As Shape magazine put it recently in an article titled “Beyond Meat’s High-Protein Veggie Burger Is the Best Thing to Ever Happen to Vegans”: “A burger that packs more protein and iron than beef, more omegas than salmon, more antioxidants than blueberries, plus tons of calcium and a whole slew of vitamins—oh, and did we mention the burger is completely vegan and soy-free? It sounds too good to be true!”

We’re here to tell you they taste too good to be true too. We prepared a bunch of them for this year’s Oscar party (the less controversial than its namesake American Slider), populated by mostly non-vegan friends, and they were the culinary hit of the party, with more than a few people remarking on their convincingly realistic meatiness.

Beyond Meat first debuted the sliders’ big brother, the Beat Burger, at a New York Mets pre-game event, touting the burgers’ whopping 23 grams of protein and other nutrients needed by athletes but sometimes hard-to-find in other plant-based foods. Which is great, obviously. But the main thing that keeps us coming back to these is how fucking good they are. Hands-down the best off-the-shelf vegan burger we’ve ever tasted.

We usually cook these stovetop with a little sesame oil, which adds to the smokiness of the flavor, but we’re excited to hit proper grilling season with these too. Discerning health foods stores and Whole Foods are your best bet for carrying these, but check the product filter on Beyond Meat’s store locator—as of writing, the Beast Burgers are nation-wide, but the sliders are select areas only. Whole Foods also offers a bagged vegan split wheat roll that has on the packaging “Great for sliders!” or something along those lines. Add your favorite vegan mayo and vegan American-style cheese slices (a la Chao or Follow Your Heart) and you’ve got zero reasons to eat red meat ever again.

Edit: A note from Beyond Meat after publication: 

“Hi Troy. Thank you for reaching out to us and for the positive review! After a super successful launch, we are making some minor labeling and supply-chain changes during which the Beast is on a brief hiatus. We are currently in full Beast mode preparing for a much larger national launch as grilling season approaches, with the Beast returning to shelves by the end of April. Thank you for your patience!”

Beast mode, returning soon!

A candle that caught my eye the other night in the way in moved and refracted light in the camera lens.

I feel like we’ve got a solid one to three new artists we get really excited about per month these days. This month, the one we can’t stop playing in the studio is French artist, Christine and the Queens.

The solo project of Nantes-born Héloïse Letissier, Christine and the Queens has already enjoyed popular success in Letissier’s native France, winning this year’s French Grammy-equivalent Victoires de La Musique awards for Best Female Artist and Video of the Year. Now she’s getting high praise from the likes of Madonna, Mark Ronson, and Lorde, who says of her song “Saint Claude”, “It’s got this beautiful music video, it’s really simple, the melodies are transcendent. I love it.”

Letissier’s songs are largely synth-based, vocal forward pop ballads—nothing out of the ordinary on paper. But both the song-writing and execution of Christine and the Queens’ music are astounding. The title track of her Saint Claude EP—which we featured on our April mixtape—moves elegantly between a word-packed, minimally orchestrated, French lyric verse and beautifully sweeping English chorus that moves me every time I hear it. And the English re-working of her French hit, “Christine”—renamed “Tilted” on the US EP—stands out as a breathily sung, slow-burn pop gem that churns along as its subtly catchy chorus and French rap break sneak their way into your subconscious.

Letissier’s cited London’s drag movement as a source of inspiration for both the band’s name and her on-stage persona, telling the Guardian she befriended a trio of singing drag queens when living abroad in 2010. “They convinced me to attempt singing. They were my Queens,” she told the news agency, “they had an incredible freedom and they showed me there is no need to check yourself because of other people.”

Christine and the Queens plays sold out shows in Los Angeles (tomorrow), San Francisco, San Diego, and New York’s Le Poisson Rouge (next Tuesday), but, as of writing, tickets are still available for her show at the Westery in the West Village next Thursday. You can listen to her track “Titled” and see the video for “Saint Claude” below.

Buy her EP—out today in the States—via iTunes and stay tuned for more dates state-side—we predict big things.

Photo by Jeff Hahn.

Just back from our very first Coachella and, I have to say, it’s pretty fucking awesome.

Sure, it was crowded with roughly 30,000 shirtless twenty-something bro-dudes and equally as many of their female equivalents (many also shirtless), but, overall, we have no complaints for a festival that brings together that many amazing musical acts.

And, though the performances and legitimately cool art were impressive on their own, the thing that amazed us both most was how very well organized the 90,000+ person event was. Sure, many of us have planned a party, but how many of us can say we’ve successfully planned a party for that many people? If you have, license to complain about Coachella granted; if not, I’d recommend chilling out, bro.

I’m looking at you, Bieber.

Above, six sequential, unedited shots of Katie at Aphidoidea‘s Chrono Chromatic—”a monumental sculpture that celebrates the festival’s broad spectrum of music and artist”; below, (spoiler!) the final state of Poetic Kinetics‘ Papilio Merraculous. Read more about the visual art at this year’s festival on Coachella’s Web site.

Finally, after deciding to pull up roots in New York City and move our lives to Los Angeles in late 2013, we embarked on a total of three drives cross-country with Allister + Owen very patiently and graciously set up in the back seat of our ’92 Vovlo 240.

We took route 40 and old 66 each time, setting aside a little time along the way to see some sites—like the Painted Desert (above)—staying with friends and in hotels, eating late night Thai food + legendary burritos with all of us in bed watching reality shows when we needed to decompress with mindless TV. Most days the drives were long and arduous, but it’s still, and I think, always will be, a time we look back on with heart-felt nostalgia, exploring America and stepping into a new life together.

Allister loved the house we moved into on Glen Green Street, with its skylights and patio and wildlife all around us. It may be the place where we sadly had to let him go in the end, but it’ll remain full of happy memories for us—him outstretched under the tree on our patio with Owen; laying pressed up against the window screen as we worked outside; curled up on our couch or on Katie’s pillow, above her head as she slept.

As long as we’re in that house, it’ll remain just as much his as it is ours, saturated with memories of him in every corner. And when we inevitably move on, we’ll happily pack those memories up with everything else we bring to our next home.

We’ll miss you, Allister.

In the fall of 2009, we moved to our favorite and final neighborhood in Brooklyn—Carroll Gardens, full of old-school Italians, beautiful brownstones, awesome bars + restaurants, and regular visitors in the forms of squirrels + birds (the latter of which Allister very much appreciated, window-side). On the very first day of that next year, we also added a kind, outgoing pup—Owen—to our family.

We met so many great, new friends in our four years in Carroll Gardens and will always hold this neighborhood near and dear to our hearts. It took the massive pull of southern California to even make us vaguely consider leaving that life behind, but, eventually, we did. Before we left though, Allister enjoyed many a sun-drenched day in our windows watching the world go by and making that weird, chirpy sound at birds outside.

Continuing on our homage to our dear cat, Allister, in 2008, we think our old Russian landlord died; we never got a clear answer. Regardless, we were forced to move out because he was out of the picture. The rumor went that his “partners” were the Orthodox Russian Jewish mob, which—god bless New York—is a thing that exists. Or did then at least.

So we left Park Slope and moved to an amazing apartment in a shitty neighborhood—Sunset Park. Not to throw shade at Sunset Park; the proper neighborhood’s cool with its awesome park and vibrant Asian American community. But we lived on the sex-shop-saturated northern border of Sunset Park. Not good, not cool. But our new landlords did a hell of a remodel on a spacious apart with a yard of all things, so how could we say no?

We weren’t there long—less than a year—but we had many lovely times in that apartment and Allister loved the back windows and yard for their feral-cat- and bird-watching.

Like we mentioned on these pages a few months back, our beloved cat of nearly 12 years (who was likely at least 17 years old himself), had not being doing well in 2015. He’d been slated for a surgery in January but the doctor discovered he had a massive, inoperable tumor in his head and gave him two weeks to live. Over three months later, Allister was still with us as of yesterday, but it’d become clear that he’d started down a road that would only end in pain and discomfort. So we made the awful, heart-wrenching decision to let him go before that happened and said goodbye to our dear boy yesterday.

Allister McVittes was more than a cat; he was a dynamic presence in our lives, one that can be felt all the more now that he’s left us. A friend put it well recently when she told us that, after so much time, animals have a way of becoming part of who we are, not just in a figurative sense, in a literal one too. They shape our behavior and habits which, over time, shape who we become. And when that part of us is suddenly pulled into the void, we’re left feeling appropriately emotionally dismembered.

Beyond all that though, he was just a really amazing animal and our best friend. That may sound shallow or trite, but it’s really not. If you knew him, you know what I mean.

I’d originally thought—after over a year of non-stop week-daily posting since last February—of going dark for the rest of this week. But Katie pointed out that a cat as rightfully ostentatious as Allister would want to be celebrated. So we’re instead going grey-and-white, posting an inordinate number of photos of this regal feline through to the weekend, today at our first New York apartment, on Sackett street in Park Slope, where we lived with him from 2003 to late 2008.

We’ll miss you more than you could ever understand, Sir Allister McVittes III. You’re unmatched in spirit, personality, and head-strong certitude in your stature here on this Earth. It’s a far worse place without you.