Earlier this summer, a soulful young crooner and her blues band introduced themselves to the world with their debut track, “Blue Jean Baby”—a sexy ode to one night stands. This band was Madi Sipes & the Painted Blue and after accruing nearly 3,000 Spotify listens in less than two months, the trio is keeping the momentum with the below EARMILK premiere of their second single, “After Hours.”
Madi’s guitar sets the mood from the go line with jazzy minor chords over Caleb’s snare hits, which echo like a distant daydream. Then Madi’s sultry, low register vocals lasso the listener and bring us back in, slow and close. The tune perfectly captures the feeling of spending an entire night falling “in lust” with a new interest, who leans in at the perfect moment to invite you behind closed doors.
Sipes explains “After Hours” as a “song about two concepts that don't typically go together—lust and innocence. “Desire is something natural,” she told EARMILK. “We all feel it, and I wrote the lyrics with this honesty in mind. During the process, we incorporated the sound of falling snow as a constant in the background, and this quickly became one of my favorite details. This image, to me, is one of the purest in nature. So, even when it’s juxtaposed with lyrics of lust and yearning guitar lines, that innocence is still present. Ultimately, "After Hours" is an expression of desire, but more than that, it’s about the fulfillment.”
The San Francisco-based trio, Madi, Caleb, and Nick, recorded “After Hours” in the Hollywood Hills with producer Andrew Heringer at Mirror Wall Studios. Heringer—who has also worked with Milo Greene, Crywolf, and Damien Rice—commented on the process of working with Madi Sipes & the Painted Blue. “The recording process happened so organically,” he said. “I had been a fan of Madi's voice and songwriting for a while. I ended up inviting her down to LA to collaborate.”
“I admire the sense of vision that Madi brings to her music,” Heringer continued. “She understands what sounds resonate with her at the core and she's very confident in communicating her truth. For me as a producer and collaborator, those qualities bring out my favorite recording experiences because it means we are creating in an environment of openness and honesty. At the end of the process, we can look back on what we've made as a reflection of who we were in a moment in time with love and pride.”
Keep eyes and ears trained on Madi Sipes & the Painted Blue. They will be releasing two more singles later this summer and will be next seen swooning Cafe Du Nord in San Francisco on September 10th.
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