NEW SINGLE 'Spilt' OUT NOW
Runnner (Los Angeles-based songwriter/producer/multi-instrumentalist Noah Weinman) is gearing up for his sophomore full-length, A Welcome Kind of Weakness, and today he's back with another new single, the jangly rocker 'Split'
"I think this is the fastest song I’ve ever written, which is ironic because I wrote it in the slowest times I’ve ever had. I started it years ago when I first moved back home from college. There was the feeling of stillness and defeat during that time that I felt again when I was stuck in bed with an achilles injury while writing this album.”
| this album sounds “so clear” in comparison to Weinman’s past work is descriptive not only of the sonic quality, but of the lyric content as well. In the wake of both his relationship and, for a moment, his body falling apart, Weinman felt compelled to “add a little more resolve” to his lyrics and to “spell out things more plainly, more narratively.” “In past songs, I was afraid to write with any sort of absoluteness or to speak straight forward because to do so would be to speak feelings I wasn’t yet ready to feel.” But on A Welcome Kind of Weakness, Weinman wanted to “own my feelings all the way.” This is clear on heart-rending ballad “Spackle,” where Weinman reflects on his former relationship as he fills holes in the walls of the home they shared. Tender memories return (“Happily snowed in / Half of the season upstate”) alongside stark images of the relationship’s decline (“You went to bed first / And I’m playing video games / Is this how love works? / Or is this how it drains?”). But on A Welcome Kind of Weakness, Weinman isn’t interested in simply gazing regretfully at the past. He’s reaching for growth and figuring out what’s next. “I’m a bit rougher with myself on this record. The blade goes deeper,” Weinman says. “But I’m able to withstand it.” If this album is a record of anything, it’s of Weinman struggling gracefully with the questions that emerge from these moments of undoing. Like on “Coinstar,” where Weinman chews over his seemingly at-odds desires to have both a touring musician’s life as well as to settle down and build a family. He wrote it while reading Sheila Heti’s Motherhood, in which the narrator parses her indecision about becoming a mother through the game of asking yes or no questions to golden coins. “I started writing wondering what it would be like to leave those decisions up to a coin flip.” Or on the deceptively uptempo “Split,” in which Weinman considers the end of his relationship alongside the old memory of moving home after graduating college—dual experiences of perceived failure set to the anthemic palette of power chords and transcendent vocal harmony. It’s these dualities—weakness/resolve, nostalgia/presence, control/powerlessness—held in such close conversation that make the songs on A Welcome Kind of Weakness so affecting and relatable. We are all perpetually pulled between poles, swinging along the spectrums of experience, but it takes a certain bravery to sit in the murky middle long enough to write about it. And in his willingness to bear witness to that transitory space, Weinman’s created a powerful reminder for listeners and for himself. You may think you won’t run again, but, given time, you might. |
| |