Liberation Records are today proud to present PRE PLEASURE, the stunning anticipated third album from 8-time ARIA-nominated singer-songwriter Julia Jacklin. Featuring singles ‘Lydia Wears A Cross’, ‘I Was Neon’, ‘Love, Try Not To Let Go’ and ‘Be Careful With Yourself’, PRE PLEASURE sees Jacklin at her most authentic, always willing to mine the depths of her own life experience, and singular in translating it into deeply personal, timeless songs.
“Making a record to me has always just been about the experience, a new experience in a new place with a new person at the desk, taking the plunge and just seeing what happens. For the first time I stepped away from the guitar and wrote a lot of the album on the Roland keyboard in my apartment in Montreal with its inbuilt band tracks. I blu-tacked reams of butcher paper to the walls, covered in lyrics and ideas, praying to the music gods that my brain would arrange everything in time.”
The binary of casual crisis is a powerful force in Julia Jacklin’s music. Since releasing her debut album Don’t Let the Kids Win in 2016, the Melbourne-via-Blue Mountains singer-songwriter has carved out a fearsome reputation as a direct lyricist, willing to excavate the parameters of intimacy and agency in songs both stark and raw, loose, and playful. If her folky 2016 debut Don’t Let the Kids Win announced those intentions, and the startling 2019 follow-up Crushing drew in listeners uncomfortably close, PRE PLEASURE is the sound of Jacklin gently loosening her grip.
WATCH: Julia Jacklin – ‘Be Careful With Yourself’
Conceived upon returning home at the end of a mammoth Crushing world tour, and finished in a frantic few months of recording in Montreal (“The songs on this record took either three years to write or three minutes”), PRE PLEASURE sees Jacklin expanding beyond her signature sound, while conjuring the ripples and faultlines caused by unreliable communication. Recorded in Montreal with co-producer Marcus Paquin (The Weather Station, The National), PRE PLEASURE finds Jacklin teamed with her Canada-based touring band, bassist Ben Whiteley and guitarist Will Kidman, both of Canadian folk outfit The Weather Station. It also introduces drummer Laurie Torres, saxophonist Adam Kinner and string arrangements by Owen Pallett (Arcade Fire) recorded by a full orchestra in Prague.
Stirring piano-led opener ‘Lydia Wears A Cross’ channels the underage confusion of being told religion is profound, despite only feeling it during the spectacle of its pageantry. It announced a new era of Julia Jacklin and the video created with frequent collaborator Nick McKinlay set the scene for PRE PLEASURE perfectly. ‘I Was Neon’ quickly became a radio favourite, with triple j adding it to full rotation on release. The gentle pulse of ‘Love, Try Not To Let Go’ and dreamy strings of ‘Ignore Tenderness’ betray an interrogation of consent and emotional injury (beneath the sheets you’re just a cave/ a plastic bucket, or a grave/ who said you’re not what you get/ you are what you gave away). The stark ‘Less Of A Stranger’ picks at the generational thread of a mother/ daughter relationship, while the hymnal ‘Too In Love To Die’ and loose jam of ‘Be Careful With Yourself’ equate true love with the fear of losing it. Gorgeous string-drenched closer ‘End Of A Friendship’ offers a grand gesture of post-communication – an effort to bestow fireworks on a friendship that’s fizzled out.
Both of Jacklin’s aforementioned albums Don’t Let The Kids Win and Crushing, resonated strongly across the globe on release. Crushing debuted into the Top 10 of the ARIA Album Chart and was included in more than 20 Best of Lists for 2019 Albums including Pitchfork, Uncut, the New York Times, Junkee, I-D, Rolling Stone and The Guardian. It was also nominated for 6 ARIA Awards and won the AIR Award for ‘Best Independent Blues & Roots Album’ in 2020, as well a US Independent Music (Libera) Award for ‘Best Folk & Bluegrass Album’. Jacklin’s songs have have been widely celebrate on radio with plays from triple j, FBi and community radio locally, plus BBC1, BBC 6 and Sirius XMU globally. In addition, Julia Jacklin has over 150 million streams to her name to date.
The release of PRE PLEASURE sees Julia Jacklin embark on a comprehensive run of dates for fans in the US, Canada, UK and Europe. The tour will span several months and see her perform at her biggest venues to date, including iconic rooms like the 3000-capacity Roundhouse in London, and 1800-capacity Brooklyn Steel in New York. In good news for Australian fans, she is set to tour nationally in February 2023, the first shows with a full band in Australia since early 2020 with headline shows in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne announced earlier this week. For full details head to frontiertouring.com/juliajacklin.
Julia Jacklin – PRE PLEASURE Out now through Liberation Records
Tracklisting:
1. Lydia Wears A Cross
2. Love, Try Not To Let Go
3. Ignore Tenderness
4. I Was Neon
5. Too In Love To Die
6. Less Of A Stranger
7. Moviegoer
8. Magic
9. Be Careful With Yourself
10. End Of A Friendship
JULIA JACKLIN – PRE PLEASURE TOUR DATES
For full details head to frontiertouring.com/juliajacklin
SAT 25 FEB – ENMORE THEATRE, SYDNEY NSW
SUN 26 FEB – THE TIVOLI, BRISBANE QLD
TUE 28 FEB – FORUM, MELBOURNE VIC