Y'all need some good heartland-indie rock for your July 4 weekend? Of course you do. Empty Country, the newer project of former Cymbals Eat Guitars leader Joseph D’Agostino, opened for fellow Stereogum-beloved rockers Los Campesinos! back in May at the Brooklyn Monarch. It was an excellent show. Turns out D’Agostino had the whole Empty Country set taped, and now he's releasing it as a surprise album called -- you're never gonna believe this -- Live In NYC. It doesn't officially drop until midnight tonight, but we have an exclusive stream of it for you lucky readers below.
Danielle DePalma engineered Live In NYC, while D’Agostino mixed and mastered it himself. He has a sweet message to go along with the album too. Here's that:
Empty Country recently opened a handful of US shows for the great Los Campesinos! Our brilliant front-of-house engineer Danielle DePalma managed to capture multitracks of the Brooklyn show, so I decided I'd go to town and mix/master it for official release to tide over the tens of rabid fans eagerly awaiting ECIII.
I rather like this three-guitar-attack configuration of Empty Country.Rachel (Browne, my lovely wife/frontperson of legendary rock band Field Mouse) and Ted (Bradley, of Strange Pains, an actual genius songwriter whose magnum opus double LP I am currently producing/ mixing) are playing and singing their asses off here. Predictably, Anne and Pat Dole deliver virtuoso performances. I, too, am present and perform satisfactorily. Adequately, even!
I'm really glad that this document of our band exists. I'm proud to know these people and to call them my collaborators and friends.
Listen to Live In NYC below, and revisit our 2023 feature on Empty Country here.
Live In NYC is out 7/4.
