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FOR THOSE I LOVE

For Those I Love

Carving The Stone

    The second album from Dublin’s For Those I Love, Carving the Stone is a stark and stirring portrait of modern Irish life. Expanding the intimate world of his acclaimed debut, David Balfe turns his lens outward - grappling with the pressures of working-class survival, the erosion of home, and the passage of time. Set to soaring instrumentals and raw spoken word, this is his most direct, urgent work to date: a deeply human collection of songs rooted in memory, resistance, and emotional honesty.

    TRACK LISTING

    Side A
    1. Carving The Stone
    2. No Quiet
    3. No Scheme
    4. The Ox / The Afters
    5. Civic

    Side B
    1. Mirror
    2. This Is Not The Place I Belong
    3. Of The Sorrows
    4. I Came Back To See The Stone Had Moved

    For Those I Love

    For Those I Love

      The severity of grief often comes across most clearly in art. What is the purpose of art but to depict human emotions for others to understand and empathise with? On his gripping new album For Those I Love, David Balfe offers a highly personalised portrait of love, loss, confusion, nostalgia and pain – that is to say, the Dublin songwriter/producer walks you through the early stages of mourning. Each savage emotion comes across as tangible and real. Balfe makes spoken word music over urbane electronica that takes its cues from alternative hip-hop and various forms of club music. His heavily accented delivery and penchant for familiar Dublin cadences means writing can only be set in one place, elevating the album among the great modern works set in the city.

      A project that started out as an ode to friendship was remodeled under a tragic cloud. Balfe conceived of For Those I Love as a solo project when he was still a member of punk band Burnt Out. Its purpose was to capture the tight-knit friendships – that is, the beauty of the relationships that exist between groups of young men that often go unspoken. Particularly, he wanted to depict his connection with best friend and Burnt Out bandmate, the poet Paul Curran. Tragically, Curran died in early 2018. In his grief, Balfe has created an album infused with the love and bond that existed between the pair.

      TRACK LISTING

      Side A
      I Have A Love
      You Stayed / To Live
      To Have You
      Top Scheme
      The Myth / I Don't

      Side B
      The Shape Of You
      Birthday / The Pain
      You Live / No One Like You
      Leave Me Not Love

      For Those Who Stay is PS I Love You's third album, and it was made after Paul quit Kingston for a different big smoke. It was encouraged by the girding strength of love but of course it's still dredging and confused, of course it's still resplendent in its churn. Of course the band had to go back to Kingston to record it - working at a place called the Bathhouse, the duo's first time in "a proper studio".

      As always, PS I Love You's songs were the result of collage and experiment: "Advice" and "Friends Forever" were still being written until the moments they were recorded. But in the studio, Paul Saulnier says, with "fancy gear" and tons of time, they could wait until they "really nailed" the perfect part. "And I think we made a very indulgent and decadent album because of it."


      TRACK LISTING

      1. In My Mind At Least
      2. Advice
      3. Bad Brain Day
      4. Limestone Radio
      5. For Those Who Stay
      6. Afraid Of The Light
      7. Friends Forever
      8. More Of The Same
      9. Hoarders


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