After teasing new material with last year’s “Idol; RE-run” (which ended up being one of my favorite tracks of the year), the enigmatic Westerman has announced the follow-up to 2020’s Your Hero is not Dead. The long-awaited follow-up An Inbuilt Fault will release on May 5th via Partisan Records.
Like “Idol”, the album was co-produced with Big Thief drummer James Krivchenia, and the press release notes that the record began with Westerman in isolation until a chance meeting with Krivchenia brought Los Angeles musicians into the fold to create a daring and more adventurous side of Westerman. Alongside the album’s announcement comes “CSI: Petralona”, which is a textured folk song that finds the artist singing in solitude until the choruses, where multi-layered harmonies come in to knock the listener off of their feet. In a way, it’s reminiscent of recent Bon Iver material where disparate parts and melodies come together to create something beautiful and incredibly unique. Westerman shares the story of the track below —
“I had the riff for the song and left it lying around with a bunch of other bits and pieces. A friend told me that Tom Waits has this image of having a musical junk drawer of old parts that you haven’t found anything to do with. It came from there. I went to Greece for a month to scope out if I wanted to move here, and a friend encouraged me to write about this strange day I had there. The lyrics were immediate. It’s presented on the album as it was first written. It’s the most autobiographical song on the record.”
Stream the track below, and keep scrolling to see Westerman’s newly-announced North American tour dates.
Westerman North American Tour Dates
5/6 – San Diego, CA @ Casbah
5/7 – San Francisco, CA @ The Independent
5/9 – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
5/10 – Seattle, WA @ Madame Lou’s
5/14 – Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge
5/16 – Minneapolis, MN @ 7th St Entry
5/17 – Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall
5/19 – Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe Tavern
5/20 – Montreal, QC @ Bar Le Ritz PDB
5/21 – Cambridge, MA @ The Sinclair
5/23 – Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
5/24 – Philadelphia, PA @Johnny Brenda’s
5/26 – Washington, DC @ Songbyrd
5/27 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle – Back Room
5/28 – Atlanta, GA @ The Earl
5/30 – Austin, TX @ Antone’s Nightclub
5/31 – Dallas, TX @ Club Dada
6/2 – Phoenix, AZ @ Valley Bar
6/3 – Los Angeles, CA @ Lodge Room
