Autumn brings new album and tour from Kathryn Williams
The Newcastle-based singer will release Mystery Park in September and share with North East audiences at a gig at The Glasshouse a month later
Singer-songwriter Kathryn Williams has trailed her 15th studio album, Mystery Park, which is set for release on September 261.
Marking 27 years of making music, the album will offer a deeply personal and reflective collection of songs, shaped by memory, motherhood, and the quiet moments of everyday life.
Newcastle-based Kathryn, who first came to wider attention with her Mercury Prize-nominated Little Black Numbers in 2000, will perform in Sage Two at The Glasshouse, Gateshead on October 30 as part of a UK tour in support of the new album.
The first single from the album, Personal Paradise, is out now. Co-written during a poet-led workshop, the song features playful lyrics inspired in part by her late dog Lucy (who appeared on the cover of album Dog Leap Stairs).
“This will be the most personal record I’ve made,” says the Liverpudlian singer, who has called Newcastle home for decades.
“The artwork is my own painting, based on the willow pattern from my grandmother’s tea sets. Each part of it ties into the songs - a map of memories.”
Mystery Park, released via One Little Independent Records, will see Kathryn reunite with producer Leo Abrahams and long-time collaborators including Neill MacColl, Polly Paulusma, Ed Harcourt, and Paul Weller.
The album sounds set to return to the sparse, intimate sound of earlier releases like Old Low Light and Relations, placing emotional honesty and lyrical detail front and centre.
Listeners can expect songs that explore themes such as identity, aging, and the passage of time - from the introspective Thoughts of My Own to the poignant This Mystery, which uses the image of a shattered record to reflect on her father’s dementia.
“Memory being unplayable in the form that it was in,” she says. “But this is a song for him, not the disease. Anyone who has had a loved one diagnosed with this cruelty will know how you just want to paint their skies blue and make everything all right.”
There are more moving tributes throughout. Sea of Shadows is a song for her eldest son, Louis.
“Parenthood isn’t fixed,” says Kathryn. “We think we will have small kids forever, but time quickens and before we know it, we have huge humans living with us where once there was a little baby.
“I love singing this song and thinking of him through the different images and travelling through time”.
The album’s closing track, Servant of the Flame, is written for Kathryn’s younger son, Ted, and the act of simply sitting beside him while he plays video games.
“Watching them evolve into their own identities. Seeing them struggle and hoping that they can navigate the ups and downs that we all face in life,” she says, adding: “This record is for anyone who’s felt something and kept it quiet.
“For those private echoes. I hope these songs give people space to hear their own.”
Tickets for the Glasshouse gig on October 30 are on sale now. Mystery Park will be released on September 26.
This is my 50th birthday, but I’m unsure if that has had any bearing on the release date.