Brooklyn-based Filipino/Argentinian artist Renata Zeiguer today shared a new single and OTIUM-directed music video for “Picnic in the Dark,” the title track from her forthcoming second album releasing April 8th, 2022 via Northern Spy Records.
Set in the nighttime of a dream desert landscape, the music video for “Picnic In The Dark” features Zeiguer singing from the remnants of a dilapidated house and an abandoned home. Visited by a UFO, she is guided through what are depicted as her personal psychological triggers with a mystical sense of security and affirmation.
On the song and album Renata explains: “‘Picnic in the Dark’ is about the process of navigating my shadows, learning to take up space, challenging fate, and finding the light within. To me the metaphor of the picnic blanket is like using a magic carpet to navigate both vast unknown territory and subconsciousness – letting things unfold with awareness while existing in an in-between state of familiarity and uncertainty, like the stillness within the eye of a storm.”
Picnic in the Dark follows Zeiguer through a dreamworld of magical realism as she navigates her memories and seeks to confront inherited dysfunctional patterns head-on. As Zeiguer reconciles her childhood and her adult lives with careful compassion, Picnic in the Dark reveals itself as an album not only of transformation, but of healing and self-actualization.
In collaboration with co-producer and old friend Sam Griffin Owens (Sam Evian), Zeiguer sonically invokes the meeting point of memories and dreams, calling to mind Broadcast, Cindy Lee, or David Lynch’s multidisciplinary ventures. With generous splashes of spring reverb, ghostly vocal harmonies, antique drum machines, cinematic strings, and the comforting warbles of synthesized organ, all bolstered by a tight indie rock sensibility, the sonic palette of Picnic in the Dark is magically anachronistic.
Fittingly, Zeiguer incorporates the sounds of her childhood—from jazz standards to classical music—but most notably the bossa nova greats such as João Gilberto, who married musical playfulness with lyrical poignancy. She shares Gilberto’s subtlety and intention of approach in every aspect of her music-making, from her hushed, deliberate vocals to her gorgeously understated arrangements and fine-tuned vintage guitar sounds. Most remarkably of all, Zeiguer has a masterful command of the harmonic and rhythmic language of bossa nova, fully capturing its romantic spirit.
In Picnic in the Dark, Zeiguer has lovingly crafted a volume of fairy tales, torchlight glowing through its golden leaves. The image conjured by that very title reveals its essence and purpose: to allow the artist, like a child lost in the pages of a story, to safely venture into the shadowy, painful corners of her psyche with a lightness of spirit and fantastical whimsy.
Read the full bio by Isabelle Thorn and preorder Picnic In The Dark here.
Tracklist
1. “Sunset Boulevard”
2. “Eloise”
3. “Evergreen”
4. “Whack-a-mole”
5. “Picnic in the Dark”
6. “Mark the Date”
7. “Child”
8. “Burning Castle”
9. “Avalanche”
10. “Carmen”
11. “Alone with Someone Else”
12. “Primavera”
Tour Dates
March 5 @ Vekmans, Atlanta, GA*
March 6 @ Richmond Music Hall, Richmond, VA*
March 8 @ Metro Gallery, Baltimore, MD*
March 9 @ World Cafe Live, Philadelphia, PA*
March 10 @ Brooklyn Made, New York, NY*
March 11 @ Crystal Ballroom, Boston, MA*
March 12 @ Empire Live, Albany, NY*
March 13 @ Horseshoe, Toronto, ON*
March 15 @ Montage Music Hall, Rochester, NY*
March 16 @ Big Room Bar, Columbus, OH*
March 17 @ The Shelter, Detroit, MI*
March 18 @ Beat Kitchen, Chicago, IL*
March 19 @ Slowdown, Omaha, NE*
March 22 @ Meow Wolf, Denver, CO*
March 23 @ Soundwell, Salt Lake City, UT*
March 25 @ Alma Mater, Tacoma, WA*
March 26 @ Chop Suey, Seattle, WA*
March 27 @ Sessions Music Hall, Eugene, OR*
March 29 @ Felton Music Hall, Felton, CA*
March 30 @ Rickshaw Stop, San Francisco, CA*
April 1 @ Ventura Music Hall, Ventura, CA*
April 2 @ Parish Room, Anaheim, CA*
April 3 @ Roxy, Los Angeles, CA*
April 4 @ Soda Bar, San Diego, CA*
April 6 @ Club Congress, Tucson, AZ*
April 8 @ The Lowbrow Palace, El Paso, TX*
April 9 @ Spider House Ballroom, Austin, TX*
April 10 @ Deep Ellum Art Company, Dallas, TX*
*w/ Summer Salt