Introducing, The Bruises. The third single from our forthcoming album ‘Excuse Me While I Vanish’, out 28th July on Chrysalis Records, the track is the follow-up to last month’s single ‘The Puppet and the Puppeteer’. The ten tracks on ‘Excuse Me While I Vanish’ marry earworm tunes with insistent, imperious, soaring rock shapes, punctuated by chorus hooks that are simultaneously nuanced and anthemic.
‘Excuse Me While I Vanish’, very nearly didn’t happen. Following the imposition of lockdown restrictions, Joseph found himself cocooned at home in Cornwall, ruminating on an uncertain creative future, watching on as his wife Mandy, a valiant mental health social worker, engaged with the all-too-real dilemmas of the pandemic-riven here and now. Her example motivated Joseph to become a temporary care worker, an experience which would provide renewed focus and influence the songwriting on the new album.
I started making videos with archival footage back in lockdown. There was no touring or work, I needed something that required no editing. A timeless image in a single take that I’d find within an hour of searching. It needed an opening shot I could put a title over and it needed to fade to black, magically and coincidentally at the same time the track ends. Not only that, it needed to convey the meaning of a song that attempts to articulate the complexities of a 23-year marriage, written from the point of view of an alter-ego so detached from reality he calls himself William The Conqueror.
I don’t know what I was searching for. I clicked on an image of a ballerina, muted the sound, pressed play on the song and sat back.
While William was bellowing at the top of his lungs, being complicated and forgetting to breathe, there was Laurie McDonald, juxtaposed to the singer’s desperation. A ballerina in 1975 trying to perform The Dying Swan on a frozen lake. She was graceful, calm, precise, undeterred by the uncertain footing. She’d slip sometimes but she never let on. She was stoic and focused. She’d get through it in her own time, all she had to do was stay committed.
It said everything I needed it to. So, thank you to Laurie for making this film 48 years ago. You saved William’s bacon big time.
The Fat Angel Sings 