Empty Country, the project fronted by former Cymbals Eat Guitars vocalist Joseph D’Agostino, have returned with “Pearl”, their first new music since 2020’s self-titled album. Of the new track, D’Agostino says:
“Hope everybody enjoys this new song. It was a pleasure to work with my wonderful bandmates and some of the world’s finest engineers (John Agnello / Greg Calbi) to make it a reality. Without going into too much detail. I’ll say this song is a direct sequel to ‘Marian’, the opener from our 2020 debut. I also wrote and recorded an audio short story as a companion piece to this new material. It fleshes out some of the characters populating the little universe we’re building. You can read / listen to it at emptycountry.com. Looking forward to sharing more music with you this year.”
Like all of D’Agostino’s previous songs, “Pearl” is an unpredictable sonic roller coaster that coasts, climbs and descends in tandem with his visionary and unusual stories. “Pearl” starts with the titular character dreaming about her grandfather’s prophecies on a day when she’s home from school on suspension for selling all her Ritalin. From there she starts practicing guitar and hallucinating about the past and the future, Empty County building up some sonic steam as we venture through this sonic portal. At the other end of this dream, Pearl seems to come out more zen, admitting “I’m a tunnel caving in” while also announcing “Any day, we’ll escape from our heads / From the chain of consequences / And recall everything forgotten”. In Empty Country’s sonic universe, anything is possible.
Watch the video for “Pearl” below or find the song on streamers.
“Pearl” is out via Tough Love. With more to come soon from Empty Country, make sure to follow them on Bandcamp, Twitter and Instagram.
