Next month, the El Paso-based musician René Kladzyk is putting out a new album as Ziemba called True Romantic. We highlighted two of its tracks a few weeks back, and today Kladzyk is releasing a new single from it, “Harbor Me,” a busy and frenetic shuffle that has a mournful quality to it, with Kladzyk ending on a deeply-intoned reminder: “I won’t forget.” She started writing the track on the S.S. Vallejo, a purportedly haunted houseboat in the Bay Area that has long been a residence for creatives. Here she is talking about it:
Vocals and nearly all synths were recorded on the boat, that first day that I wrote it. This song took me by surprise, it has an energy to it that I don’t entirely understand, and it doesn’t fully feel like it came from me. I guess that’s why I feel tempted to credit the boat itself as a co-author. I wanted the music video to have that same immediacy and visceral presence that the song has. It was exciting and fun and a little scary at times, dancing through the streets at night. We rehearsed over the course of two evenings until we got it right. I think ‘exciting, fun, a little scary’ is how I’d hope this song would be described, or at least is how I perceive it, so the video is fitting.
Watch and listen below.
True Romantic is out 9/25 on Sister Polygon. Pre-order it here.
