VIDEO AGE Releases New Album 'AWAY FROM THE CASTLE'

Video Age has released their new album Away From The Castle via Winspear Records. Across four albums, longtime friends and songwriting partners Ross Farbe and Ray Micarelli have gleefully worn their influences on their sleeve, but for their latest LP, they've thrown nostalgia out the window, embracing their own unique sense of musicality for an album that feels like Video Age distilled to its purest form. 

Inspired by sessions working on Drugdealer's album Hiding In Plain Sight, and with Farbe further honing his production skills with artists like Esther Rose, the band decamped to a remote cabin for eight days jamming, cooking, and writing together. Joined by touring members Nick Corson and Duncan Troast, Away From The Castle is a document of a band having fun and rediscovering their love for making music together, all while making their best songs to date. The band will celebrate the release with a run of release shows, kicking off tonight in New Orleans before heading to Austin (Levitation Festival), New York, Los Angeles, London, and Paris.

Listen below!

Previously, Video Age shared singles “Is It Really Over?,” which FLOOD Magazine praised for its “upbeat shades of new wave,” “Golden Sun,” an achingly gorgeous reimagining of the Kinks' “Waterloo Sunset,” “Better Than Ever,” an infectious, driving ode to their songwriting partnership that The FADER called “immaculately crafted,”  and which followed “Away From The Castle,” a barn-burning country-tinged rocker Paste Magazine called “a mountainous, organic earworm of cosmic proportions.” 

 

Tour Dates:

TICKETS

 

2023

Oct 27th - New Orleans, LA @ Hotel Saint Vincent

Oct 29th - Austin, TX @ Parish (Levitation Festival)

Nov 3rd – Los Angeles, CA @ Genghis Cohen SOLD OUT

Nov 11th – Brooklyn, NY @ The Broadway SOLD OUT 

Nov 14th – London, UK @ Moth Club

Nov 16th – Paris, FR @ Supersonic Records 

 

2024

Mar 5th - Atlanta, GA @ The Earl

Mar 6th - Carrboro, NC @ Cat's Cradle

Mar 7th - Washington, DC @ Songbyrd

Mar 8th - Philadelphia, PA @ PhilaMOCA

Mar 9th - New York, NY @ TV Eye

Mar 10th - Boston, MA @ The Rockwell

Mar 12th - Montreal, QB @ L'Esco

Mar 13th - Toronto, ON @ The Garrison

Mar 14th - Cleveland, OH @ Mahall's

Mar 15th - Chicago, IL @ Schubas

Mar 16th - Minneapolis, MN @ Underground Music Cafe

Mar 19th - Vancouver, BC @ The Pearl

Mar 20th - Seattle, WA @ Madame Lou's

Mar 21st - Portland, OR @ Polaris Hall

Mar 23rd - Reno, NV @ Holland Project

Mar 24th - San Francisco, CA @ Cafe Du Nord

Mar 27th - Los Angeles, CA @ The Echo

Mar 28th - San Diego, CA @ The Casbah

Mar 29th - Phoenix, AZ @ Valley Bar

Mar 30th - Albuquerque, NM @ Sister

Mar 31st - Denver, CO @ Lost Lake

Apr 2nd - Denton, TX @ Rubber Gloves

Apr 4th - McAllen, TX @ The Gremlin

 

Tracklist:

01 Ready To Stay

02 Better Than Ever

03 Away From The Castle

04 Adrian

05 In The Breaks

06 How Long's Eternity?

07 Just Think

08 Anything For You

09 A Knight Shining With No Armor

10 Is It Really Over?

11 Golden Sun

 

More on Away From The Castle: 

Video Age make breezy and timeless songs that are so ineffable, they can only be the result of a decades-long friendship and songwriting partnership. Across four albums, Ross Farbe and Ray Micarelli have gleefully worn their influences on their sleeve, writing inviting tunes that reference sounds ranging from disco to pop and indie rock. On their latest LP, Away From The Castle, the New Orleans duo have strayed from nostalgia and instead have honed their own unique sense of musicality, making organic songs that sound like themselves with a taste of inspiration from classic singer-songwriters of the 60s and 70s. The album is a testament to the possibilities that come from getting out of your comfort zone, the freedom of writing vulnerably and unselfconsciously, and the joys of getting to work with your closest companions. 

After releasing their critically-acclaimed third album Pleasure Line in 2020, Farbe and Micarelli returned home from tour feeling creatively stuck. “When it came time to play the shows, it was so fun, but then we got home and I thought, ‘What do I want to make?'" says Farbe. “I felt disconnected from what we were doing before.” Micarelli, on the other hand, decided to write through the feeling of being unmoored. During this period, they took creative inspiration by collaborating with other people. They worked with Drugdealer on his album Hiding In Plain Sight, Micarelli gigged throughout New Orleans' jazz and blues scenes, and Farbe recorded local artists at his home studio, most recently producing Esther Rose's new album Safe to Run. This allowed them to give their own music a full refresh. “We realized we needed a breath of fresh air,” says Micarelli. Joined by touring members Nick Corson and Duncan Troast, they rented a cabin in Eunice, Louisiana where they spent eight days in August 2022 jamming, cooking, and writing together. 

This time away from their routines was freeing for every band member, especially Farbe, who finally overcame his writer's block. Single “Better Than Ever,” the first song the band wrote for the album, started as Micarelli's tribute to writing with Farbe. Over glistening synths and a driving bass line Farbe sings, “When I'm at the point that gets me down / You step it up, you're better than ever / There by my side, two so proud.” The track serves as an ode to their partnership and a motivational speech between friends. “If I can't come up with an idea, Ross can fill in a gap and vice versa,” says Micarelli. Opener “Ready To Stay” is another ode to the duo's sturdy bond–Micarelli wrote the song as a housewarming present for Farbe and his partner. "I saw Ross and Sarah starting a new stage in their life together and it was really moving. Plus, I want them to invite me over more." 

Lead single “Away From The Castle,” a barn-burning country-tinged rocker, is so infectious it practically broadcasts the joy the band experienced during their cabin retreat. According to Farbe and Micarelli, the track started as a synth-heavy demo before Farbe decided to replace those tones with a twangy guitar riff. The result is euphoric, Farbe singing, “Pull me back, let that slingshot set me free / Telephone ring, I thought a scam was likely / I'll go back, when they come out here and make me / From my house out in the trees.” The track's enthusiasm serves as a mission statement for the album, playfully self aware but brimming with the joy of reinvention.

At the cabin, the fact that each band member was collaborating in a room together marked the first time Video Age decided to hone in on their live sound rather than bedroom recording and overdubbing. “Sometimes in the past, the sounds inspired the song but here the songs informed the production,” says Farbe. This “songs first” approach allowed them to create on their own terms, freely experimenting rather than attempting to sound a particular way. On Away From The Castle, there are dancefloor-ready jams like “Just Think,” autotune interludes in “A Knight Shining With No Armor,” and Simon and Garfunkel-evoking folk on “In the Breaks.” 

This new approach also led to lyrical breakthroughs. “We were doing something exciting we've never done and with that came the kind of more emotional lyrics,” says Micarelli. The LP's emotional centerpiece “Is It Really Over?”, a slow-burning synth tune about reconciling with a breakup, proved especially cathartic for Farbe. “Sometimes you start writing a song about the smallest little moment in your life but you end up really touching on some emotions that you didn't know you could even put into a song,” he says. On the closing track “Golden Sun,” the band melancholically imagines a day in the life of the lonesome protagonist from the Kinks' classic “Waterloo Sunset.” 

Through this process, it seems that Video Age have made their best collection of tracks to date. Perfectly alchemizing their influences and experiences into a record still tinged with nostalgia, but moving towards a more succinct and authentic voice. “From the beginning with this album, we weren't trying to fit into a genre, we were just making what was exciting to us,” says Farbe. Away From The Castle is a document of a band having fun and rediscovering their love for making music together, but it's also their most honest and personal work yet–Video Age distilled to its purest form.

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