Angel Olsen (Photo by Kylie Coutts)
Angel Olsen unveils “Waving, Smiling,” a new single from Whole New Mess, her forthcoming album out this Friday, Aug. 28. on Jagjaguwar.
That same day, Angel performs in a livestream for her Cosmic Stream series on Noon Chorus!
Recently, Angel presented an intimate live performance of “Waving, Smiling” shot by Ashley Connor at Asheville’s Masonic Temple. Throughout “Waving, Smiling,” the singer-songwriter lays her feelings bare: “I’ve made my bed, made up of all my fears // all my fears cried out all of those years // cried out all of those years // Now baby I’m lying // Laid out and smiling.”
When she hits the high, quavering notes of the tender waltz, you can hear Olsen push against the lump in her throat, wrestling with the worry of her past and what it means for her future. “‘Waving, Smiling’ in my head is the last scene, a slow motion realization of love not lost but at peace somewhere within myself,” Angel said. “It’s the bittersweet end of a chapter of my life — it is the final acceptance that despite coming to an end all of that time was not lost or wasted.”
Watch Angel Olsen perform “Waving, Smiling” live at the Masonic Temple on YouTube:
Recorded in late October 2018, Whole New Mess is a vulnerable, emotional portrait that presents Angel working through a period of personal tumult with just a few guitars and some microphones, isolated in Anacortes’ The Unknown. Although at least nine of the 11 songs on Whole New Mess should sound familiar to anyone who has heard Olsen’s grand 2019 masterpiece, All Mirrors, these are not demos.
Instead, Whole New Mess is its own record with its own immovable mood. The songs are webs of moods and moments and ideas, qualities that can change from one month to the next and can say just as much as the perfect progression or an exquisite chord. In that sense, these 11 songs — solitary, frank, and unflinching examinations of what it’s like to love, lose, and survive — are entirely new.
Angel performs live for Cosmic Stream 3, the third in her livestream series, on the album’s release date and stream from the Hazel Robinson Amphitheater in Asheville, North Carolina, via Noon Chorus.
Angel Olsen
Noon Chorus
Friday, Aug. 28
Show @ 9pm ET
$15 Advance/ $17 Day of/ $41.99 Album bundle
All ages