Pale, Through the Window Ruston Kelly

• 1 Pale, Through the Window 02:49
• 2 Give Up the Ghost 04:25
• 3 Wayside 03:26
• 4 Half Past Three 03:27
• 5 Me and You 02:42
• 6 Twisted Root 04:10
• 7 Still 05:08
• 8 Waiting to Love You 03:41
• 9 I See You 03:30
• 10 Pickleball 03:34
• 11 House in the Country 03:38
• 12 Great Wide Open 03:23
• 13 All In 04:33
• Total Runtime 48:26

Info for Pale, Through the Window

Ruston Kelly’s Pale, Through The Window is a stirring 13-song portrait of renewal, weaving hard truths, healing, and love into his most openhearted and spiritually grounded album yet.

Ruston Kelly’s new album Pale, Through The Window marks a turning point for the Nashville singer-songwriter, capturing the clarity and joy of a man who has fought his way through addiction, grief, and personal reckoning and come out with hard-won hope. Across 13 songs, Kelly delivers a raw yet radiant portrait of renewal, balancing unflinching vulnerability with moments of unguarded love.

The album moves through shadow and light. The title track offers a somber meditation, while “Twisted Root” digs deep into Kelly’s history with addiction. In contrast, “Waiting to Love You” and “Wayside” shine with unvarnished affection, framing love as both a sanctuary and a defiant act in a chaotic world. Kelly’s intent is clear: to remind listeners that joy is real, even when complicated, and that love remains the most powerful force at our disposal.

“This album feels like a return to the truest, purest, most complete version of who I am as an artist and a human being,” Kelly says. “I wanted to write about joy in a way that was still honest and complicated, because that’s what real joy is. It carries everything that came before it.”

Produced by longtime collaborator Jarrad K and recorded live at Chateau Noir with Kelly’s touring band, the album feels both intimate and instinctive. The sound is a layered mix of shimmering synths, pedal steel played by his father Tim “TK” Kelly, emo-tinged guitars, and Kelly’s pop-punk sensibility. The result is warm, immediate, and deeply human, underscoring songs that grapple with faith, healing, and new love.

Pale, Through The Window is Ruston Kelly’s most emotionally expansive and spiritually grounded work to date, a collection that mirrors his own transformation and extends a hand to anyone searching for light in the darkness.

Ruston Kelly

Ruston Kelly
Since making his debut with 2018’s Dying Star, Ruston Kelly has built a catalog of songs that search for transcendence in the most devastating and demanding of experiences: addiction, the strenuous work of self-evolution, the fallout of broken relationships. But in the writing of his latest album, the South Carolina-born artist found himself in unfamiliar emotional territory—a state of sustained joy and inner peace, brought on by a spiritual breakthrough and the dawning of a new love. Brimming with the grit and depth that’s always defined his output, Pale, Through the Window ultimately affirms Kelly as one of modern music’s most astute observers of the human heart and spirit.

“For most of my life I’ve felt comfortable writing about darker subject matter with a slight silver lining of hope, asking questions like ‘Why do people suffer, and how can we find communion and joy in the middle of the suffering?’” says Kelly. “Before this album I didn’t quite have the songwriting muscle required to write about joy more directly, which meant that I had to develop some new muscles and find my voice in a whole different way.”

The follow-up to The Weakness—a 2023 release that earned major acclaim from the likes of Rolling Stone, The New York Times, NPR and led to his appearance on “Late Night with Seth Meyers”—Pale, Through the Window finds Kelly reuniting with his longtime collaborator Jarrad K, who also helmed production on Dying Star and 2020’s Shape & Destroy. The first body of work he’s recorded with his longtime touring band, the album centers on a singular sonic palette that often merges synth with pedal-steel guitar while fully embracing Kelly’s ardent love of classic pop-punk and emo—ultimately bringing a raw and potent energy to his soul-searching songwriting.

Over the course of Pale, Through the Window’s 13 songs, Kelly offers up everything from the somber rumination of the LP’s title track and the rueful longing of “Twisted Root” (an intimate look at his history with addiction) to the radiant open-heartedness of love songs like “Waiting to Love You” and “Wayside” (a euphoric but unvarnished portrait of love against the backdrop of a world in flames). And in sharing such an all-embracing account of his journey to acceptance and peace, he aspires to provide others with the courage to persevere through their own personal chaos. “If someone’s struggling with doubt or hopelessness because of the state of the world or their relationship with God or with themselves, I hope this record leaves them with the sense that it can be okay and that love truly is the most powerful force we have available to us,” says Kelly. “I also hope they feel at least a sliver of the freedom and joy I felt in writing these songs—even if they’re just having a good time bobbing their head to ‘Waiting to Love You,’ I want everyone to be reminded that the world can be a joyful place.

This album contains no booklet.