{"title":"Beauty Pill","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"please-advise","title":"Beauty Pill - Please Advise","description":"\u003ciframe style=\"border: 0; width: 100%; height: 42px;\" src=\"https:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/album=1322819076\/size=small\/bgcol=ffffff\/linkcol=0687f5\/artwork=none\/transparent=true\/\" seamless\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/beautypill.bandcamp.com\/album\/please-advise\"\u003ePlease Advise by Beauty Pill\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title of this record was inspired by our circumstance. Please Advise is a liminal work. A document of a time of uncertainty and fragmentation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI'm proud of this record, but it's not perfect. I will go one step further: I'm proud of this record because it's not perfect.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll I wanna do is keep moving. Please Advise meets this criterion. For me, at least.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI hope people find it valuable.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe named our record PLEASE ADVISE after producer Teo Macero’s famous 1969 memo to Columbia Records about Miles Davis (“Miles just called and said he wants this album to be titled BITCHES BREW. Please advise.”) It’s darkly funny to us now, but I bet it wasn’t funny to Teo then.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI find that memo to be encouraging. Even in working with an artist as brilliant and masterful as Miles Davis, there were moments of uncertainty and maybe even panic. Like “What is this motherfucker doing?” panic.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThere's probably no aesthetic connection between Miles Davis and Beauty Pill, but that memo makes me feel better about my own path. It’s okay if sometimes I don’t know what I’m doing. It’s okay if sometimes you don’t know what I’m doing either.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe paradox of any artist’s life is you need to cultivate confidence AND humility to survive.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut you know what? That’s the paradox of your life too.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThanks for listening.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eChad Clark\u003cbr\u003eWashington, DC\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Northern Spy Records","offers":[{"title":"Limited Edition \"Bone\" Colored Vinyl + Digital","offer_id":44667183759583,"sku":"LP-NS-128LE2","price":23.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Standard Black Vinyl + Digital","offer_id":44667183792351,"sku":"LP-NS-128","price":22.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD + Digital","offer_id":44667183825119,"sku":"CD-NS-128","price":13.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Cassette + Digital","offer_id":44667183857887,"sku":"CS-NS-128","price":8.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"FLAC Download","offer_id":44667183923423,"sku":null,"price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"MP3 Download","offer_id":44667183890655,"sku":"","price":8.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0677\/9256\/8543\/files\/BeautyPill_PleaseAdvise_5x5_300dpi-SQUARE-e1646418786664.jpg?v=1703789738"},{"product_id":"instant-night","title":"Beauty Pill - Instant Night","description":"\u003ciframe style=\"border: 0; width: 100%; height: 42px;\" src=\"https:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/album=2496786268\/size=small\/bgcol=ffffff\/linkcol=0687f5\/artwork=none\/transparent=true\/\" seamless\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/beautypill.bandcamp.com\/album\/instant-night\"\u003eInstant Night by Beauty Pill\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title track to Beauty Pill's new EP, \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=73LJV8CBdM0\"\u003e\"Instant Night,\"\u003c\/a\u003e was originally written by bandleader Chad Clark in 2015 after he watched Ann Coulter, as a guest on Real Time with Bill Maher, predict that Donald Trump would win the 2016 US presidential election. The Washington, D.C. based artist recorded and surprise-released the single in October 2020 out of urgency to inspire people to vote in the presidential election. Because the song was being recorded during the pandemic, and because Clark has an artificial heart that puts him at high risk for COVID-19, it was recorded on a rooftop, with meticulously planned social distancing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Instant Night\" is Beauty Pill's first single without drums, and it is also the first Beauty Pill song to conspicuously highlight the band's woodwind quartet. The single was released alongside a music video featuring time-lapse footage of Trump, Lindsey Graham, and Mitch McConnell being drawn and depicted as monsters. \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=73LJV8CBdM0\"\u003eThe video\u003c\/a\u003e was created and directed by the artist \u003cex-beauty\u003e Ryan Nelson.\u003c\/ex-beauty\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e+ + +\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOf \"Instant Night,\" Beauty Pill's Chad Clark says:\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLast year I came to my band with a song called “Instant Night.”  I was nervous about presenting it to them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“This one is unusual.  There are no drums and it kinda sounds like Philip Glass music.  I don’t know where it came from exactly.  I wrote it a few years ago, but I think we should do it now. I think it’s kind of urgent, actually.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBeauty Pill is not a dictatorship.  The people in my band are all strong-willed artists themselves and they don’t just agree to do whatever I tell them.  Not every idea gets ratified, trust me.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut they seemed to quickly understand the song and understand the reason why I wanted to do it.  Remarkably, it took us only a few hours to develop and learn the arrangement that you hear now.  It came together almost magically.  And it felt natural.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe next step was convincing our label Northern Spy to rush-release the song before the election of 2020.  The label staff had a full docket of planned releases with other artists at that point. This was certainly an unwelcome request.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI’m sure the label was privately exasperated with this request, but they understood why it was an important song for that moment.  “Instant Night” was released digitally a couple weeks before the November election.  It was a complete surprise to Beauty Pill fans.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eListen, I operate under no delusions that my little arty DC post-punk band brought about the downfall of Donald Trump.  But I do think we contributed in a tiny, granular way.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe last words of the song are “Scared is alright” and I think everyone who heard it, felt it.  I do think that America was teetering on the edge of a very frightening plunge into the obliteration of pure fascism and bigotry at that moment.  And I think voters narrowly averted that crisis.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe lyrics of “Instant Night” are insinuating and allusive, not topical. It’s only a political song in the way that Dylan’s “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall” or Public Enemy’s “Fight The Power” are political songs. People call them “protest songs,” but neither of those songs is as specific as people think.  Go back and listen again.  They’re pretty abstract!  They are more poetic than polemic.  I see “Instant Night” as existing within that spectrum too.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnd I think it will last.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e+ + +\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOf the EP's send single, \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/music.beautypill.com\/bettermind\"\u003e\"You Need A Better Mind,\"\u003c\/a\u003e Clark says:\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Roland TB-303 is an old Japanese synthesizer that was designed to convincingly mimic the sound of a bass guitar.  It was introduced in 1981, it sounded like a toy and failed miserably, and it was ultimately discontinued in 1984.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt makes freaky, wiggly, cartoony sounds.  It sounds fuck-all like a bass guitar.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhy am I telling you this?  One ended up in my hands for a week.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eI did a lot of silly stuff with it.  I did come up with this one worthwhile riff, which I built a song around.  The song is called \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=z6Ulig_f7IQ\"\u003e\"You Need A Better Mind.\"\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt was recorded with my band in a single take at the end of a recording session for another song. We were tired. None of us cared that much if we failed. The fun spirit you hear in this song is mostly exhaustion… that kind of punchy exhaustion you get late at night when you’ll laugh at anything.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe lyrics were inspired by the spooky\/funny 10-minute movie \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\/341842996\"\u003e“Rachel.”\u003c\/a\u003e  The song is about the scourge of American loneliness.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt is by far the fastest, easiest song Beauty Pill has ever created.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe hope you like it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e+ + +\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eBeauty Pill - 'Instant Night'\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eProduced by Brown Eno\u003cbr\u003e\nRecorded in Kimani Clark's rooftop apartment, Washington DC\u003cbr\u003e\nand Magpie Cage Studios, Baltimore\u003cbr\u003e\nMastered by Heba Kadry\u003cbr\u003e\nDesigned by Nora McKelvey\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBeauty Pill is\u003cbr\u003e\nBasla Andolsun: bass\u003cbr\u003e\nChad Clark: voice, guitar\u003cbr\u003e\nDrew Doucette: guitar\u003cbr\u003e\nErin Nelson: voice\u003cbr\u003e\nDevin Ocampo: drums, guitar\u003cbr\u003e\nwith\u003cbr\u003e\nVictoria Banos: trumpet\u003cbr\u003e\nAaron Harman: bassoon\u003cbr\u003e\nSarah Hughes: saxophone\u003cbr\u003e\nDon Godwin: tenor horn\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Northern Spy Records","offers":[{"title":"Limited Edition Transparent Vinyl + Digital","offer_id":44667188805855,"sku":"LP-NS-137C","price":29.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Limited Edition Transparent CD + Digital","offer_id":44667188838623,"sku":"CD-NS-137","price":11.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"FLAC Download","offer_id":44667188871391,"sku":"","price":4.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"MP3 Download","offer_id":44667188904159,"sku":"","price":4.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0677\/9256\/8543\/files\/BP-Instant-Night-digital-2-1-e1646413671934.jpg?v=1703789919"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.northern-spy.com\/collections\/beauty-pill.oembed","provider":"Northern Spy Label Group","version":"1.0","type":"link"}