Birthdays Keaton Henson

• 1 Teach Me 04:25
• 2 10am Gare du Nord 03:58
• 3 You 04:42
• 4 Lying To You 05:18
• 5 The Best Today 04:29
• 6 Don't Swim 04:56
• 7 Kronos 04:10
• 8 Beekeeper 04:13
• 9 Sweetheart, What Have You Done To Us 03:30
• 10 In The Morning 04:01
• 11 Milk Teeth 03:51
• 12 If I Don't Have To 03:37
• 13 On The News 03:22
• 14 Teach Me (The Album Leaf Remix) 05:49
• Total Runtime 01:00:21

Info for Birthdays

“One of the most beautiful voices I've heard” recently proclaimed NPR Music's Robin Hilton when describing the rising young poet laureate of heartbreak Keaton Henson. Already an acclaimed visual artist and now an emerging musical sensation back home in England, Henson has just released his new album Birthdays in North America via Anti-.

Produced by Joe Chiccarelli (The White Stripes, The Shins, The Strokes) and recorded in Los Angeles, far from the the reclusive Englishmen's safe haven in North London, Birthdays uses Henson's brilliant debut Dear... as a point of departure, adventurously expanding the sonic palette while retaining every bit of its heart and soul.

Though created almost entirely on guitar, Birthdays generates an affective sound that is unexpectedly complex and powerfully evocative. The lyrics are so deeply personal it can feel voyeuristic, recalling the confessions of a close friend or lover. If one were to reach for a point of reference, it would be figures such as Nick Drake and Tim Buckley or even Dylan Thomas and Oscar Wilde. In an early review of Birthdays, the BBC proclaimed, “Henson’s stripped-back sound is almost shocking in its purity.”

“This follow-up to last year's impressive debut, Dear, is no less musically intense or lyrically unflinching, but now Henson's quavering anxiety has flesh on its bones.” (Uncut)

“The British singer-songwriter has drawn comparisons to Nick Drake, Tim Buckley, but tracks like “Lying To You” and “Sweetheart, What Have You Done To Us” sound crisper and more sonically complex than any material those two ever produced.” (AV Club)

"Henson's private agony is proving addictive." (The Guardian)

"Beautifully fragile" (Evening Standard)

Keaton Henson

Recorded at Sunset Sound, The Bank Studios and Lightship95 Engineered by Geoff Neal, Bill Mims Mastered by Brian Lucey at Magic Garden Mastering Produced by Joe Chiccarelli

Keaton Henson
was born in the dying days of the 1980s. At school, he was that weird kid drawing strange pictures in a notebook in the corner of the playground, and listening to hardcore bands on the bus. His heroes then were artists and illustrators like Edward Gorey; his heroes now are songwriters like Randy Newman and Loudon Wainwright. All three reveal the kind of artist Keaton strives to be: someone who understands the power of honesty, even when it is heartless, and how only that can make one's art truly heartfelt.

Keaton Henson’s debut album, Dear..., was released quietly in late 2010, in a limited edition run, hand-made by Keaton. Here were simple, tender songs, stripped to the marrow, and written without the desire to be heard... though they sold out almost immediately.

Its follow-up, Birthdays, goes even further. Written and recorded in less than a year, a toughness veins throughout Birthdays, addressing the challenges of newfound and newly-lost love. This is the sound of what happens next, once your private agony goes public overnight. And in more ways than one, Birthdays presents the perils of getting what you wished for.

In the summer of 2014, Keaton released his third album, Romantic Works. This entirely instrumental album was inspired by the simplicity of Arvo Pärt, Phillip Glass and Henryk Gorecki as well as the melodic instrumentation of Edward Elgar, and is a collection of stories that Keaton could not translate into words. Dubbed “bedroom classical”, the album was recorded in his small London bedroom with close friend and Guildhall virtuoso cellist Ren Ford. Keaton assembled layers to the pieces using found objects and charity shop instruments, creating a bold indie-classical crossover.

In early 2015, Henson composed a score for Young Men, a feature-length dance film from BalletBoyz, which went on to win the 2017 Rose d’Or and Golden Prague awards. Shot on location in France, the film stars the BalletBoyz dancers as soldiers experiencing the brutality of the First World War in a captivating hybrid of drama and dance, combined with Keaton’s strikingly haunting music and the eloquent choreography of Iván Pérez.

Keaton has become a frequent collaborator with the critically acclaimed BalletBoyz dance company, which was founded in 2000 by ex-Royal Ballet dancers and has since become Associate Artists at Sadler’s Wells Theatre. Keaton most recently worked with Tony and Olivier Award-winning choreographer Christopher Wheeldon to score his latest 2019 project Us, which after an initial successful run at Sadler’s Wells was transferred to the Vaudeville theatre on London’s West End.

His score has been met by rave reviews, including; ‘The music and dancing work so well together that it’s difficult to separate them.’ – The UpComing (Jim Compton-Hall), and ‘combined with Keaton Henson’s lushly romantic score, it’s an achingly beautiful ode to love.’ – Time Out.

In 2018, Keaton premiered his eagerly-anticipated 70-minute string symphony Six Lethargies to a sold-out Barbican audience, with Mark Knoop conducting the Britten Sinfonia. It has since received its Irish premiere in Dublin, and its Australian premiere at the Sydney Opera House in May 2019, and is soon to be recorded for future release. Henson's music has also featured in numerous TV series including In The Flesh, Derek, Elementary, Blacklist and in the 2014 film X+Y (known as A Brilliant Young Mind in the US).

This album contains no booklet.