Bartees Strange - Shy Bairns Get Nowt [EP]

“Bartees Strange is the Jordan Peele of indie rock – an auteur who directs everyday fears into his shapeshifting music.” – The Line of Best Fit

“Sophisticated rock… his best album yet.” – MOJO ****

“Steady and unflashy yet ready to stoke crescendos.” – The New York Times

“An incredible statement of intent, there are sonic departures and evolutions aplenty.” – Record Collector

“A chimeric blend of alt-rock, funk, hip-hop, and dance.” – New York Magazine

“Perfect… I could live in that groove forever.” – NPR Music

“Indie rock triumph.” – Rolling Stone

“Precocious in its energy and infectious in its tone.” – Clash

“Heading in a blockbuster direction.” – FADER

“A boundary-blurring indie rocker of the highest order.” – Stereogum

Bartees Strange releases a new EP, Shy Bairns Get Nowt via 4AD. The EP features music recorded while making the critically acclaimed recent album Horror, including new single “Ain’t Nobody Making Me High” – a love song punctuated by impassioned ad-libs and ear-catching sing-along chorus. The EP also contains Horror producer Jack Antonoff’s version of “Baltimore.”

Of the EP, Strange says: “I heard somebody say this when I was on tour in Europe and for whatever reason it rang in my ears for a while. I think it’s a northern UK saying that means quiet mouths don’t get fed.  Sometimes you have to speak up to get what you want. I think about music and the gratefulness we all must have to be part of it. But also – what’s wrong with having demands, things you want out of it. These songs are from making Horror and from writing sessions I’ve done over the last couple years – sort of songs that didn’t fit the record but felt like a step in a different direction. I love them – and I wanted to put them out – so I said something.”

Bartees Strange also recently announced new tour dates for November, playing solo acoustic shows across the US, including 4 dates playing with Joy Oladokun. See the full routing below and find tickets HERE.

Shy Bairns Get Nowt is now available digitally on all streaming platforms – listen HERE.

Bartees Strange’s latest album Horror was released earlier this year and includes explosive lead song “Lie 95,”uproarious confessional anthem “Wants Needs,” sonic love letter “Too Much,” introspective ballad “Sober” and album closer “Backseat Banton.” Horror was co-produced by Strange, Yves and Lawrence Rothman (Yves Tumor, Lady Gaga) and Jack Antonoff. Throughout the record, Strange lays down one difficult truth after another, all over a sonic pastiche of music that soundtracked his childhood. Across the album’s 12 new tracks are genre-bending threads of the music his dad introduced him to – Parliament Funkadelic, Fleetwood Mac and Teddy Pendergrass – merged with Strange’s interest in hip-hop, country, indie rock, and house.

Since releasing his 2022 breakout album Farm to Table, Strange has toured alongside boygenius, Clairo, Dijon and The National. Recently, his music has been featured on multiple TV and film soundtracks including Apple TV’s The New Look and A24’s I Saw The TV Glow.

Born in Ipswich, England to a military father and opera-singer mother, Bartees Strange had a peripatetic childhood before eventually settling in Mustang, Oklahoma. Later, Bartees cut his teeth playing in hardcore bands in Washington D.C. and Brooklyn whilst working in the Barack Obama administration and the environmental justice movement.

Check out recent Bartees live performances on NPR’s Tiny Desk, Jimmy Kimmel Live and Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney below.

Tiny Desk Concert (playing ‘Wants Needs’, ‘Sober’, ‘Too Much’, ’17’)

Jimmy Kimmel Live (playing ‘Backseat Banton’)

Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney (playing “Sober”)