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PREMIERE: Nathan Bowles Blends Folk Tradition and Charming Absurdity on “Moonshine is the Sunshine”

His third solo LP, ‘Whole & Cloven’ is out September 2.

Multi-instrumentalist Nathan Bowles has been making a name for himself in Steve Gunn’s band for a while now, elevating the Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter’s folk compositions. But Bowles is his own artist, an alumnus of legendary Virginian drone-folk act Pelt, whose ability to combine traditional compositions with a uniquely modern sensibility has set him apart on his two solo albums to date, A Bottle, A Buckeye and Nansemond.

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With a new album, Whole & Cloven, out September 2 on Paradise of Bachelors, Bowles is premiering “Moonshine is the Sunshine”—which was written by Jeffrey Cain—on Noisey today, a charming and introspective track. Bowles’s lyrics veer into beautiful absurdity as quickly as they fall back into traditional laments. First he’s thinking about the fish drinking up the sea, the next he’s got bills to pay “and no place to borrow.” His voice wanders over a steady, syncopated banjo that allows his sweeping guitar to rise up through the gaps.

Check it out below.

Catch Nathan Bowles on tour:
August 18th – Durham, NC – The Pinhook (w/ Jackie Lynn)
August 27th – Richmond, VA – Black Iris Gallery
September 8th – Chapel Hill, NC – The Center For The American South, UNC (Whole & Cloven record release show)

Alex Robert Ross is thinking about moving to North Carolina all of a sudden. Follow him on Twitter.