Office Romance Will Release Debut Album, Holidays of Love

COVID-19 brought us all indoors for long stretches of time, which gave us the opportunity to reexamine the importance of friends, family and our community. Perhaps that is why the new LP from Office Romance feels so universal. A year after recording the music, it took the isolation of Covid to generate lyrics and vocals that capture the true spirit of the holiday season as told by the collaboration of this unique group. With Holidays of Love, Office Romance has created original music to celebrate the true joy and excitement of the holidays.

With a plethora of holiday music industry wide focusing on reproductions of the standards by modern artists, Office Romance has created a new set of holiday tracks as timeless as those by Bing Crosby, Wham! and John Lennon.

A long-awaited follow up to their debut EP, I love the Holidays, Office Romance's debut LP Holidays of Love hits on October 2nd via Frenchkiss Records. Featuring ten original tracks written by the trio of Seth Jabour (Les Savy Fav, 8G Band- backing band for Late Night with Seth Myers), Syd Butler (Les Savy Fav, 8G Band) and Amy Carlson (Actor, Blue Bloods, The Society, Director, Writer, Mother) the new effort emerges as a spankin' new set of originals to pass on to future generations.

A true family affair, Holidays of Love features vocal contributions by Butler/Carlson's children, Lyla and Nigel as well as the Jabour twins, Teddy and William, on "Magic in the Air." Speaking of the album's "Flurry" which daughter Lyla wrote, Butler notes, "It was important for me to have as much family on the record as possible. 'Flurry' added that extra holiday spice that was missing, I think without that song it feels like a very different record." Vocalist/lyricist Amy Carlson adds "When [Lyla], (now thirteen) was eleven. She was inspired by watching Syd and Seth create new music daily and said 'I want to do that'. She came up with this beautiful piece that felt very George Winston "Winter"-esque, so we asked her to contribute to the record." Other contributors boosting the holiday spirit include: Matt Hitt, (Drowners), Fraser Campbell (multi-hyphenate musician and composer), Britta Phillips (Luna, Dean & Britta) and Kia Warren/Liza Colby (SUSU Band) among others.

Much like the classic Jimmy Iovine series A Very Special Christmas albums that compiled the likes of Paul McCartney, U2, Run DMC and more, Holidays of Love is an eclectic effort that touches on everything from indie rock to rockabilly to piano ballads to Americana and more. And while the album maintains a singular sentiment throughout that makes the holiday-radio-as-an-album theme cohesive, the longplayer tackles subjects ranging from family, love, holiday melancholy, neighborly kindness and even the glory of Hanukkah. Eclectic in presentation yet whimsical and sincere in execution, Office Romance reflects the union of Amy Carlson's obsession with holiday music and Syd Butler / Seth Jabour's desire to stretch their collaboration into a new realm.

"In addition to writing the lyrics, Amy sings on the opening track and we had a lot of fun with that." notes Butler. Jabour adds "having the experience of playing in the 8G Band for six and a half years has really helped. In Les Savy Fav, we've had kind of one vision as a group but with 8G we're sort of pulling information from every genre possible, funneled through the lens of players, singers, and producers."

Office Romance recorded the music for the LP in May 2019 at Renegade Studios with Geoff Sanoff producing (James Iha, Jesse Mailn, Savak) later adding vocals through a variety of creative solutions recorded during Covid lockdowns in NYC in May of 2020. After which Joe Lambert mastered the LP.

Office Romance's Holidays of Love is a refreshing addition to your rotation of holiday albums, able to sit comfortably beside established favorites like Vince Guaraldi and Mariah Carey. It's varied enough to please an array of palettes, cheerful enough for the joy to translate to one and all while exploding with earworms crawl their way into your head and stay there, Yet most importantly, Holidays of Love underlines what is most important in these most urgent of times: holding those you love tight and cherishing them not only during the holidays, but all year round.

Photo Credit: Nigel Butler

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