Today, February 19, singer, songwriter, producer, guitarist, pianist and percussionist White Cliffs has released his debut EP Stockholm. A nod to the artsy Brooklyn loft space the artist who is Rafe Cohan has been living in, the four-track EP is a collection of songs that effortlessly blends psychedelic elements with indie rock, soul and electronic in genre-bending harmony.
Of the EP, White Cliffs says, “Stockholm is a project that really represents my last five years in New York. I’ve lived in a few different studios all in the same building, on the same street. It’s very exciting for these songs to be public…songs that I’ve tested out in cars and on friends’ sound systems hundreds of times. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them.”
Listen to Stockholm here: orcd.co/whitecliffsstockholm
The Stockholm EP kicks off with “Who You Are,” a classic relationship song with a blurry, fuzzy quality about the standoff that occurs when things need to be worked out better and that it’s worth figuring it all out. “It’s like when somebody insinuates that you are not satisfied with their identity but it’s more about the relationship as a whole than the person.”
The dynamic anthem “Just Like You” is a dazzling merry-go-round of guitar effects that sounds like a Ferris wheel or amusement ride at sunset. “It’s about imposter syndrome – it’s about the person rather than the person everyone knows.” In January, White Cliffs released “Just Like You”, the first single off Stockholm. The track premiered in American Songwriter and a self directed and produced claymation music video for the track followed in early February. Check it out here.
“Lonely Guy” pops and pulses on the keys with a faint, manipulated vocal, reflecting the song’s meaning. “It’s really about the unfortunate profitability of division. The song tells a dark little tale of someone who sows division in a community for personal financial gain.”
Finally, “Kick The Can” offers a wholesome, campy guitar riff as an old person is at the end of their fulfilled life. “When you’re old, everyone’s distraught about their limited time left with you. Meanwhile, you try to explain that it all makes a lot more sense at the end. We were picturing some guy driving into the sunset somewhere in the southwest US, without a care in the world.”
Last year, separately from the EP, White Cliffs released a double single “Six Cylinder Run” and “On My MInd” with accompanying music videos. The songs tell the tale of a cross country road trip from Brooklyn to Los Angeles with each track representing a different leg of the trip. Rafe says, “Last summer I met this new friend. I didn’t know him very well but we became very tight when he was moving to LA… His roommate bailed on him and he was supposed to drive across the country so I went with him and we made an EP with me in the passenger seat of a car with no real instruments, just on a laptop. The two songs represent the two legs of the trip.”
About White Cliffs:
If there are two sides of a musical coin, Brooklyn-based White Cliffs (A.K.A. Rafe Cohan) is a purist on one and an unconventional creator on the other – in one moment enveloped in the mastery of instruments and another lost in the art of producing. It’s a complex that he might at times find to be a curse to his canvas, but in reality, it is the reason behind the resulting collage of sound. After years of honing his craft and experimenting with a variety of instruments, genres and vocal styles, under the moniker White Cliffs, the act’s music took off starting in 2017, securing a cross-country tour with Big Wild, among other acts like Elderbrook, STS9, in addition to a set at the Panorama Festival in New York City and debuting a four-person band at CRSSD Festival in San Diego. White Cliffs latest release is the double single “Six Cylinder Run”/”On My Mind.” Look for his new EP Stockholm to be released February 19.
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