The Reds, Pinks & Purples – New Leaf: 13th Floor New Song Of The Day
The Reds, Pinks & Purples – the acclaimed indie pop project spearheaded by prolific San Francisco-based singer-songwriter and musician Glenn Donaldson – have shared their gorgeously bittersweet new single, New Leaf, available everywhere now via Fire Records.
Here is the blurb with more:
An official music video, directed by filmmaker/musician Karina Gill (Cindy, Flowertown), is streaming now on YouTube. With Donaldson’s drolly nostalgic musings cushioned by a perpetual guitar line that effortlessly plucks at the heartstrings, New Leaf heralds the arrival of the Reds, Pinks & Purples’ eagerly awaited new album, due from Fire Records later this year.
“People read some of the more humorous lines in my songs as irony,” says Glenn Donaldson, “but honesty is funnier. These songs are just me, even if the sentiments seem exaggerated. There’s enough abstraction in the images on this one that the listener can find their own messages.”
With each release, the Reds, Pinks & Purples continue to expand their universe of beautifully bruised pop, leaving an indelible mark on hearts across the world. Having written more than 200 songs and released nine albums in just six years, Glenn Donaldson has shaped a distinctive brand of emotional pop music built for the quiet hours and the restless mind. Donaldson makes unabashedly melodic indie pop in the late ’80s mold, sketching out the simplest and sweetest of pop songs from the barest of elements: strummed guitar chords accented with occasional synth or Casio keyboard line, undercut by the gentle patter of a drum machine with lyrics so bitterly melancholy and mildly misanthropic they would be heartbreaking if the music itself wasn’t so appealing. His songs crystallize the tragic, self-mythologizing kingdoms of fortunate failures, misfit heroes, and humanity in all its romanticized wonder and woe.
Last year saw the Reds, Pinks & Purples make their Fire Records debut with The Past Is A Garden I Never Fed, a collection of 14 tracks previously unreleased on physical format that weave the turmoil of small talk and everyday water-cooler moments with a fine sense of pathos and irony. “Feels like a compendium of short stories,” wrote CLASH, “[with] lyrics that are full of vim and bite.”
STREAM/PURCHASE THE PAST IS A GARDEN I NEVER FED
From its humble beginnings as a home recording project, the Reds, Pinks & Purples have recently blossomed into a sporadic live unit with tours on both sides of the Atlantic and appearances at Pitchfork Music Festival London and Woodsist Festival, as well as support slots alongside indie legends such as Destroyer, Guided By Voices, and The Feelies. Upcoming shows include a hometown double-bill with NYC’s Constant Smiles set for San Francisco’s The Knockout on January 22. Additional dates will be announced soon.
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PRAISE FOR THE REDS, PINKS & PURPLES:
“Glenn Donaldson chronicles the ups-and-downs of music industry lifers, searching for pockets of transcendence amid ennui…(His) best work hides allure within a bigger picture, like a jangle-pop egg hunt.”
– PITCHFORK
“A checklist of pessimism, from artistic careers to life choices…The Reds, Pinks and Purples merge the 1960s and the 1980s at their most dejected. They share the ringing picked guitars of folk-rock
with the bitter tunefulness of the Smiths and the Go-Betweens.”
– THE NEW YORK TIMES
“Glenn Donaldson may be the defining voice of what it feels like to hang resigned disappointment on a person in the 2020s…(The Reds, Pinks & Purples’) songs are timeless reminders that pop can heal all wounds and bridge decades. Straight pop songs for sure, but remarkable ones to say the least.”
– RAVEN SINGS THE BLUES
“Donaldson’s undeniable homage is exquisitely on the nose,
one comforting swoon after another.”
– MOJO
“Inspired songs that allude to some of the greats that came before them while landing somewhere new…
Glenn Donaldson’s songwriting is brilliant and intelligent…
its wry charm shines through no matter what new direction he takes with his tunes.”
– ALLMUSIC
“(The Reds, Pinks & Purples) seem like the perfect band to tackle these fraught times in measured music. Their brand of DIY pop has always carried clear-eyed themes with a hint of wry satire that matched their slightly subverted melodies…With sumptuous tones, they tackle strands of culture and people
who have lost their way in a variety of ways in the modern age.”
– FAR OUT
“A master class in doing more with less…The Reds, Pinks & Purples’ songs are built from Glenn Donaldson’s winsome vocal melodies, his sigh of a singing voice, restrained rhythm sections, gently played guitars (of the jangling electric and/or strummed acoustic variety) and, often, the soft glow of a keyboard or synth…Donaldson uses the limits of the sound to his advantage by weaving an almost narcotic instrumental foundation that complements and enhances his gifts as a tunesmith and a storyteller.”
– BANDCAMP DAILY
“Glenn Donaldson’s songs lodge sharp words in the softest sonic textures. Musically, he conjures caressing grace, a wash of synths, a twinkle of strummed guitars, the soft rueful solace of murmured vocals. But within these parameters, the lyrics sting. Reds, Pinks & Purples songs are lullabies
that throw the most excellent shade, wistful daydreams with a bitchy, gossipy heart.”
– DUSTED
“Bathe in the hallowed afterglow of a former golden age of shoe-gazing indie pop courtesy of the sublime, glittering guitar strumming vehicle of US songwriter Glenn Donaldson…There is a very contemporary and yet timeless messaging in the lyrics, whether questioning if the world needs another band or warning that you are never safe from yourself. Often very literal, never shy of coming forward. Littered with wonderful fuzzy distorted guitar leads and floating above the mix the infectious breathy singing of Donaldson. Melodic, mithering. Your toxic friends.”
– NARC
“Another band that could be our life…There is a hushed, thoughtful, and somewhat wistful thread that weaves itself through (Donaldson’s) songs, the sound of a man lost in his thoughts as he navigates the world.
We are listening in on his inner space, moments of contemplation and questioning,
glimpses of romance that occasionally cut through the everyday.”
– LOUDER THAN WAR
