Prolific Philly singer-songwriter Alex G has a couple lanes he’ll reliably travel down. The freaky, noisy, in-your-face indie rocker full of grim imagery and tense soundscapes, the Alex of “Brick” and more recently of “Blessing.” And then there’s the from-the-heart, striking and sincere troubadour songsmith in the vein of Elliott Smith — writer of earnest tunes like “Proud,” and now, “Runner” — Alex G’s remarkable new single, and a fantastic taste of his next album.
The 13-song record will be called God Save The Animals, it’s out on September 23rd via Domino Recordings, and it (like all his albums) features impressionistic cover art by Alex’s sibling Rachel Giannascoli. According to Bandcamp, the songs meditate on ideas of spirituality, not from a religious doctrine sense, but more the holistic way it can be woven into our lives. “Beyond the ambient inspiration of pop, Giannascoli has been drawn in recent years to artists who balance the public and hermetic, the oblique and the intimate, and who present faith more as a shared social language than religious doctrine.”
It’s something you hear in the opening lyrics of “Runner” — “I like people who I can open up to / Who don’t judge for what I say, but judge me for what I do.” The song comes with a warm and intimate music video that shows the band performing the song in a blue-gray studio. Check it out below, pre-order God Save The Animals here and get tickets and more information on Alex G’s two-night stand at Union Transfer on November 18th and 19th over at the WXPN Concerts and Events page.