Kevin Devine releases 10th full-length LP, 'Nothing's Real, So Nothing's Wrong' today via Triple Crown Records

For immediate release:

March 25th, 2022

KEVIN DEVINE

RELEASES HIGHLY ANTICIPATED

10TH FULL-LENGTH ALBUM

NOTHING'S REAL, SO NOTHING'S WRONG

OUT TODAY

LISTEN TO THE ALBUM HERE

LISTEN TO NEW SINGLE

"IT'S A TRAP!" NOW

HEAR THE NEW ALBUM PLUS MORE

LIVE THIS SPRING ACROSS THE U.S.

TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW HERE

["Albatross"] is gorgeous, breezy, wood-wind-synth infused indie rock...["Override"] is beautifully ornamented indie rock."

"Cinematically expansive"

"“Albatross” is enough evidence that Devine is at the top of his game and honestly has never been better. It’s luscious, intricate, and another expert example of Kevin Devine’s stellar songwriting."

"How Can I Help You?" [adds] to the empathetic nature that defines his work across all avenues. It's a tender embrace in a world that so often feels cold and uninterested in helping others."

Painting Credit: Valerie Hegarty | Download hi-res LP artwork

Today, New York-based songwriter and musician Kevin Devine finally shares his highly anticipated cinematic album, Nothing's Real, So Nothing's Wrong out everywhere now via Triple Crown Records. Plus, hear the new music and more live this spring as Kevin Devine heads out on tour across the U.S. with support from Pronoun, Kississippi and Kayleigh Goldsworthy, beginning on April 6th in Baltimore, MD. Tickets are on-sale now and can be purchased on kevindevine.net.

Over the eleven tracks, Devine aims to preserve himself as he wrestles with existential questions amidst immense struggle and collapsing societal systems. Produced by longtime collaborator Chris Bracco, the expansive work is an eclectic mix of orchestral acoustic indie, lo-fi psych-folk, and melodic guitar pop. Devine manages to brilliantly strike a delicate balance between being intimate while vast, personal while universal, and discouraged yet hopeful as he aspires to re-imagine something bigger and believes in something better.

The release of the album comes after Devine treated fans to the first three dynamic, well-received singles, "Albatross," "How Can I Help You?" (plus a bonus acoustic version premiered by The FADER) and "Override." Each track offers a slightly new, refined side of the musician, yet sees Devine remain fiercely true to himself.

"It's A Trap!" is a whimsical, tongue-in-cheek tune where Devine repeats in the chorus, "It’s a trap! /

And I set it! / Now we’re in it and we’re all gonna die." Devine describes the track as what he thinks a pop song is, saying, "sugar and salt on the tongue and in the gas tank, gallows humor at the moment of transition/transcendence, and you can’t save your ass and your face at the same time, and the only way out is through, and the truth will set you free, but how free do you want to be?"

By digging deep into his own humanity after a tumultuous few years, Devine is able to examine the darkest corners and brightest lights of the human condition, and in turn uncover more of his artistry like never before. "'Nothing’s Real, So Nothing’s Wrong' is a grown-up break-up record, for strugglers by a struggler." says Devine. "It’s a record about fatherhood written during a pandemic. It’s a kitchen-sink 10th album pivot, painstakingly brought to life by two career-long collaborators and their shared and split obsessions. Lyrically evocative, excavating and unflinching without irresponsibly printing your journals.”

Hear the album and much more of Devine's extensive, versatile catalog live this Spring as Devine tours across the U.S. Tickets are on sale now here, and find a full list of dates below.

Devine's career began in the early 2000s with the band Miracle Of 86. From there he struck out on his own, performing solo and with his ever-evolving backing collective, The Goddamn Band, eventually forming Bad Books with Manchester Orchestra. In 2015, Devine started his Devinyl Splits 7" series with Craig Finn, Matthew Caws (Nada Surf), David Bazan, The Front Bottoms, Meredith Graves (Perfect Pussy) and many more. In addition to playing as a solo artist, Devine has served as a touring member of several bands, and performed extensively and internationally with a range of other artists such as Frightened Rabbit, John K Samson and Julien Baker, amassing a loyal, fervent following along the way.

With his momentous tenth record, the prolific singer-songwriter takes his artistry to new heights as he reveals profound personal struggles, pushes against broken systems and expertly paints an illustrious, quietly intricate portrait of a life greater than the one he knows–in effort to preserve himself. Kevin Devine's long-awaited full-length album, Nothing's Real, So Nothing's Wrong, via Triple Crown Records is out everywhere now.

Photo Credit: Erik Tanner | Download hi-res

Kevin Devine Tour Dates

Spring 2022

With Kayleigh Goldsworthy

Wednesday, April 6th - Baltimore, MD - Ottobar *

Thursday, April 7th - Cleveland, OH - Mahall's *

Friday, April 8th - Buffalo, NY - Mohawk *

Saturday, April 9th - Toronto, ON - Velvet *

Sunday, April 10th - Detroit, MI - Shelter *

Tuesday, April 12th - Minneapolis, MN - 7th Street Entry *

Wednesday, April 13th - Chicago, IL - Lincoln Hall *

Friday, April 15th - Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg *

Saturday, April 16th - Boston, MA - Sinclair*

Friday, April 29th - Philadelphia, PA - FU Church !

Saturday, April 30th - Columbus, OH - A&R Music Bar !

Sunday, May 1st - Nashville, TN - Mercury Lounge !

Tuesday, May 3rd - Dallas, TX - Tulips !

Wednesday, May 4th - Austin, TX - Antone's !

Friday, May 6th - Phoenix, AZ - Crescent Ballroom !

Saturday, May 7th - Los Angeles, CA - The Roxy !

Sunday, May 8th - San Diego, CA - Soda Bar !

Monday, May 9th - San Francisco,CA - Great American !

Wednesday, May 11th - Portland, OR - Doug Fir !

Thursday, May 12th - Seattle, WA - Chop Suey !

Saturday, May 14th - Salt Lake City, UT - Kilby !

Sunday, May 15th - Denver, CO - Bluebird !

Tuesday, May 17th - St. Louis, MO - Off Broadway !

Thursday, May 19th - Orlando, FL - Soundbar !

Friday, May 20th - Atlanta, GA - The Masquerade !

* Dates with Pronoun

! Dates with Kississippi

Kevin Devine Bio

In the very first line of her 1959 novel The Haunting Of Hill House, the late author Shirley Jackson writes, “No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality.” That conviction is shared by musician Kevin Devine on his upcoming 10th LP Nothing’s Real, So Nothing’s Wrong, a beautiful, surreal, cinematic bedroom-rock fever dream. Its title, hewn from the chant-sung chorus of lead single “Albatross,” nods to this. In the face of incomprehensibly desperate struggles, a new spiritual paradigm is a necessity: “If you’re sinking, sing along/Nothing’s real, so nothing’s wrong,” sings Devine.

Like Jackson’s observation, it’s not an encouragement of retreat; it’s an inward solution in the name of preservation, a personal reorientation toward struggle in a collapsing landscape riddled with failed systems and vacant coping mechanisms that breed malignant internalizations.

“Part of what’s so scary about all of this stuff happening outside of us is so much of it feels so surreal and cynical,” says Devine. “We’ve invested in a version of reality that is almost so perverse that it can’t be real. Trying to find a solution to that almost involved seeing the thing as it is and invalidating it to yourself: it’s not that I’m poor, it’s that capitalism is fucking broken and rapacious. It’s not that I’m not a real man, it’s that masculinity is broken. It’s not that I’m not strong because I’m not violent, it’s that militarism has infected everything we look at.”

This is the central thesis linking the record’s 11 tracks, which drift between orchestral acoustic indie, lo-fi psych-folk, and melodic guitar pop. “They’re all excavating a particular brand of how to operate in a crisis, spiritual and familial and cultural,” explains Devine. “Rather than a spiritual bypass that tells me I’m being taken care of by some invisible architect, it’s like, ‘Everything is exactly as it is and a lot of what I invest in actually isn’t real and doesn’t need to be invested in.’ Nothing’s Real, So Nothing’s Wrong might be a little pithy, but how do I get through today? Sometimes that’s the best answer.

“I see it as a kind of stepping outside and taking some sort of virtual scalpel and carving a safe space for yourself, not to exist in denial but in a kind of re-enfranchised opposition.”

Devine wrote most of the record’s songs between January 2019 and March 2020, working remotely with collaborator Chris Bracco. Drums for the record were cut in studio, but otherwise Devine and Bracco recorded in their homes, with Devine using a four-channel mixer to record guitars. With no strict timelines, the duo explored and applied extra-tonal structural features, experimenting with different synths, sub-bass frequencies, sound effects, and found sound, like bird songs or street proselytizers or Devine’s daughter recounting a dream she had.

While releases like 2016’s Instigator embraced what Devine describes as vertical expressions of dynamics, like the “spiky, power-pop, loud-quiet, Nirvana-Pixies thing,” this collection expresses itself theatrically, in broad, horizontal textures and palettes. Devine and Bracco were influenced in particular by the Flaming Lips’ Soft Bulletin. “Flaming Lips were like, ‘What if we made sweet Beatles songs then made them as fucked up as possible?’” says Devine. “There’s a little bit of that spirit that animates this too.”

Sequenced and designed to be listened to from start to end, the record shudders awake on “Laurel Leaf (Anhedonia)” with a whoosh of found sound as Devine’s daughter’s voice enters, couched on eerie synths before a mechanical Elliott Smith guitar riff spirals listeners down a sonic and thematic rabbit hole. Follow-up “Override” snaps up the torch and continues with a charged, gothic, synth-and-guitar gymnastic routine that eventually collapses into a strings-led bridge, then reignites for a raucous finish. “How Can I Help You” begins with ricocheting synth before thumping into a spirited, upbeat rumble and a joyous chorus complete with chiming bell tones.

“Albatross” picks up these cues with crackling vocals before a wall of guitars, bass, drums, and woodwind synths waltzes straight up to the quiet, hymnal bridge: “Nothing ventured, nothing gained/Nothing matters anyway/If you’re frightened, stay awake/Pick a god and start to pray.” Eventually the instruments explode back in, sweeping up Devine’s titular creed-chanting in a maelstrom outro. On Side B, “It’s A Trap!” is pure, melody-forward bedroom-power-pop bliss that shifts gears effortlessly, and moody country-noir riffing leads “Tried To Fall In Love (My Head Got In The Way)” into a delirious, harmony-laden ‘70s rock daydream. The record closes quietly on “Stitching Up The Suture,” a contemplative come-down resolving in a whoosh that bleeds right back into the first track.

Nothing’s Real, So Nothing’s Wrong is a tactical reengagement with the world, an ad-hoc spiritual system to preserve one’s self while dancing between the gnashing, blood-stained gears of capitalism. The cultivation of this system is important: the self is one of the few spaces where we can truly resist. “You can try to take everything external from me, but you’re not gonna be allowed to take the space between my ears and in my chest,” says Devine. “That’s the space that actually animates how I will move around in the world. And I still have to be in the world every day.”