Today's Song of the Day, as chosen by Cheryl Waters, host of The Midday Show on KEXP, is "Only Lonely" by Rose City Band, from the 2020 album Summerlong on Thrill Jockey.
Portland-based musician Ripley Johnson returns with his project, the appropriately-titled Rose City Band, the latest addition to his musical resume that also includes Moon Duo and Wooden Shjips. While the "band" name might allude to a larger outfit, the Rose City Band is more of a solo endeavor for Johnson, with just the addition of John Jeffrey on drums.
While his Moon Duo partner Sanae Yamada was committed to a theatre project, Johnson took to his home studio to write and record this sophomore album, Summerlong. With today's Song of the Day, he taps into those feelings of isolation, revealing in a press release:
“There are times when you’re feeling so down that you wish you were just plain lonely. I think there’s a sense of resilience in it, though, a determination to roll with the punches and push on through. I wrote the music a while back and figured it would be an upbeat kind of tune. I guess I was just pretty down when I got around to writing the lyrics.”
