After a year spent writing, recording and performing, Brooklyn-based alt-folk group Del Water Gap are now readying the release of a new single, “Vanessa.” The trio consisting of band founder S. Holden Jaffe (lead vocals, guitars, harmonica), Charles Schlinkert (drums, percussion), and William Evans (bass, piano, background vocals) haave shared the song below!
On Vanessa, Jaffe shares:
‘‘Vanessa’ was written in a basement in Reykjavik, Iceland two years ago while I was working for Valgeir Sigurdsson at Greenhouse Studios.
‘About a week earlier, I had shown up at the Reykjavik airport from London at 2 AM with nowhere to stay, but had scrambled and found a room for rent in this old woman’s basement near the studio.
‘The room was below the ground floor, but I had a little skylight where the midnight-sun would stream in and keep me up.
‘So I did a lot of writing there, nestled in this little suburb of Reykjavik. There was a brook and rabbits everywhere and the light made everything feel very surreal.’
‘Vanessa was co-produced with David Kahne (The Strokes, Lana Del Rey, Regina Spektor).
‘We had talked about working on the vocal comp together, so I met David at Avatar late one Tuesday night to go over the tracks.
‘He told me stories about Japan and then we trawled Reddit for a while before we started moving the song around and playing with spaces.
‘I left four hours later with the finished arrangement.’
To celebrate the release of Vanessa Del Water Gap played single release show at Berlin in New York, NY on October 21st. Be on the lookout for more from Del Water Gap in the coming weeks and months, and stream Vanessa out now.