Photo by Annie Forrest
Slow Drugs by NYC's (by way of Switzerland) Sam Himself is as captivating as Sam's white blonde shock of hair. I don't know if it is the hypnotic drum beat with the patterned delay, or the trance-able guitar sound, the sustained leads, chunky guitar rhythms or Sam's incredibly solid sultry commanding low vocal drawl, sometimes spiked up with a female harmony but all of it is so beautifully drawn like Sam Himself. Slow Drugs is the lead single off of Sam's EP of the same name out in May. The video goes way beyond an explanation, you just have to see it and you will.
-Robb Donker Curtius
THE FACTS AS WE KNOW THEM - PRESS NOTES:
Sam Himself, a transplant from Switzerland now in New York City has returned. "Slow Drugs" is the lead single off of his EP, Slow Drugs out in May and features Josh Werner (bass - Iggy Pop) and Parker Kindred (drums - Jeff Buckley) under the direction of mixer and producer Daniel Schlett (DIIV, The War on Drugs), Sam’s longtime creative collaborator, first listener, and second Beatle.
Sam - '"Slow Drugs” began with a particular person and experience in mind, but the song kept growing in scope until it became this jubilantly morose ode to a strange time in my life, an adventurous and slightly insane period I tried to make sense of by writing about it (still trying).
The music video for "Slow Drugs" was shot entirely in Switzerland and, unfortunately for Sam, on roller skates. Several near-death experiences on unsecured mountain passes notwithstanding, the video follows Sam, a prodigal son returned from exile, as he rediscovers the Swiss Alps and tries to make his way across the peaks and cliffs of a region of Switzerland he’s never been to before. The result shows the odyssey of a proverbial stranger in his own land. These visuals capture the tension between the song’s themes of familiarity and alienation, intimacy and loneliness, beauty and destruction - and of course the artist’s majestic grace on skates.
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