Natalie Prass guides Eric Slick “Closer to Heaven” in new video

Local multi-instrumentalist Eric Slick, best known for his work in Dr. Dog, released “Closer to Heaven” today. The song, featuring a guest appearance from Slick’s collaborator and wife Natalie Prass, is the second single off of his upcoming album Wiseacre, out August 14.

The video for “Closer to Heaven,” in which Slick awakes in a scarlet house, was inspired by a recurring dream in which the artist is trapped in a three-story house, representing hell, purgatory, and heaven, and featuring characters from his past. Prass serves as guide, away from the hellish house, through a bluish forest, and finally into the open fields of heaven. The song itself plays on the dynamic between the two vocalists, while the unique sound of the guitar solo was created thanks to a pedal that was too powerful for its power supply, intermittently shorting out.

Slick says of the new song,

“Closer to Heaven” is a song about reaching for enlightenment and salvation in love while you’re full of internal doubts and questions. I asked my partner Natalie Prass to sing on it because I felt it was the centerpiece of my album Wiseacre. It’s a representation of our love story and how we learned to grow together. Her voice acts as a [G]reek chorus, a collective reaction in response to the mystery and confusion of the verses. She is a force of solitude in it, just as she is in our day to day lives.

Wiseacre as an album is inspired by and meant to celebrate Prass and Slick’s recent marriage, exploring his anxieties and insecurities leading up to their wedding. The first single, “When It Comes Down To It,” showed Slick admitting that he may not be as complex as he wishes to believe. “Closer to Heaven” arrives at the album’s midpoint, with Prass acting as a guiding figure through Slick’s worries.

Watch the video for “Closer to Heaven” below.