Mary Timony – Cutting A Distinctive Path
Mary Timony — singer, songwriter, and guitar legend — presents her new single/video, ‘The Guest,’ from Untame the Tiger (out February 23rd on Merge), her first new solo album in 15 years.
Following lead single ‘Dominoes,’ the stripped-back acoustic instrumentation of ‘The Guest’ conjures Sweetheart-era Byrds. Recorded in Baltimore at J. Robbins’ Magpie Cage studio, ‘The Guest’ features David Christian on drums and Brian Betancourt on bass, with Betsy Wright and Dennis Kane singing backup.
Mary describes it as a song sung directly to loneliness: “I was imagining loneliness as a house guest who keeps knocking on your door. I thought it would be funny to say loneliness is the only one who always comes back.”
The accompanying video for ‘The Guest,’ made by Mary’s longtime friend and collaborator Brett Vapnek, was filmed around Santa Barbara. “The first video Brett and I made together was in about 1995 for the Helium song ‘Honeycomb,’ and later she also did one for ‘Dr. Cat’ (on The Golden Dove). I also acted in a short movie she made called Dream Machine,” Mary says.
For more than 30 years, Mary Timony has cut a distinctive path through the world of independent music. Praised by Rolling Stone as one of the “Greatest Guitarists of All Time,” she has built her reputation off of “rewriting the guitar rulebook.” Untame the Tiger marks Timony’s fifth solo album and is a startling document of an artist fully coming into her own power during the fourth decade of her career, the product of lessons learned during life-altering struggle. Although she has remained a cult hero and critical favorite since the early ’90s, appearing everywhere from 120 Minutes episodes to Coachella sets, Timony’s many triumphs have long been counterbalanced by crippling doubt and self-nullification.
Produced by Mary Timony, Joe Wong (composer on Master of None, Russian Doll, The Midnight Gospel, Krapopolis, host of The Trap Set podcast), and Dennis Kane, the mystical, guitar-driven Untame the Tiger emerged after the dissolution of a long-term relationship, and was bookended by the deaths of Timony’s father and mother. The album was recorded during a two-year period during which she was the primary caregiver for her ailing parents. “I started realizing that I gotta control the things that I can,” says Timony, who would write songs while going on mind-clearing walks and bike rides around her native Washington, DC. “Because I was making impossible decisions on behalf of my parents, creative choices now seemed more manageable. Since I had to confront the reality of loss, I realized what was important to me about being alive, and I became less scared. The record became my anchor in a time when I was losing so much around me. It felt like all I had—a guide that helped me through, and gave me hope.”
Mary Timony
Untame the Tiger
Out February 23rd on Merge Records
Tracklisting:
1. No Thirds
2. Summer
3. Dominoes
4. Looking for the Sun
5. The Guest
6. Don’t Disappear
7. The Dream
8. Untame the Tiger
9. Not the Only One
PHOTO CREDIT: CHRIS GRADY
