For almost 20 years, Dayton, Ohio-based guitarist/songwriter Nick Kizirnis has explored songs and styles ranging from Americana to pop, and from rock’n’roll to surf and experimental. He has also worked with Tobin Sprout (Guided by Voices) and The Breeders (last year’s “The Dirt Eaters” single for 4AD).
Since releasing his 10th album, The Distance, Kizirnis has seen his music shared across U.S. and Europe, and has now begun releasing a series of singles reimagining his diverse songwriting style.
Kizirnis and co-producer Patrick Himes decided to “re-imagine” “Way to Me” – a song that originally appeared on Kizirnis’ most recent album The Distance – after Kizirnis worked out solo arrangements of those lush break-up songs using loops and ambient guitars. The temptation to see what they could create with a fresh perspective was too great to resist.
“Way to Me,” re-imagines his moody “indie noir” songwriting style with modular synth textures and electronic drums, transforming the song’s original Roy Orbison/Twin Peaks vibe into strange yet welcoming territory. Enlisting the help of vocalist Kate Wakefield’s (Lung), whose lush, dreamy vocals evoke a fever dream, and Mark Patterson (Son Volt), whose manipulated drums veer from roots rock to electronica and almost back again, Kizirnis’ guitars melt down into a pile of circuits and wires, emerging almost unrecognizable.
Despite the change in sound the song’s story about a message of love across the distance remains intact. As Wakefield sings “You’ll find your way back to me” the song holds on to hope, trust, love, and friendship that can endure any separation.
“On ‘Way to Me,’ we tried several approaches to recording it and were very happy with how it turned out,” Kizirnis recalls. “Then last winter I thought ‘what if we tried to make one of my songs sound completely different from the album?’ So, producer Patrick Himes and I took Kate Wakefield’s amazing vocal and Mark Patterson’s great arrangement of ‘Way to Me’ and drowned it in strange electronics and effects and anything that got us in a different space. We ended up with a new song that still conveyed the same feelings of finding your way back to the ones you love, but with a very different vibe.”
“Way to Me” sees release tomorrow, August 26, as a digital single on Spotify and all major streaming platforms. The song sees additional release Friday, September 2, for Bandcamp Friday as both a digital download and a limited-edition of 25 hand-cut lathe 7-inch single by Robin Raymond, owner of Red Spade Records in Toronto – the only woman who cuts records in all of Canada.
Catch Kizirnis live here:
Saturday September 10th – Porchfest, Troy, Ohio (with Kyleen Downes)
Friday September 16th – Yellow Cab Tavern, Dayton, Ohio (with Kyleen Downes)
Saturday October 8th – The Comet, Cincinnati, Ohio
Saturday October 22 – Dayton Music Fest 2022
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Photo by Jennifer Taylor
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