New Dawes Album Possesses a ‘Rugged Urgency’

The Los Angeles-based band Dawes just announced that its seventh studio album, Good Luck With Whatever, arrives via Rounder Records on Oct. 2. The first single, “Who Do You Think You’re Talking To?” is out now. 

Produced by Dave Cobb (Chris Stapleton, Brandi Carlile, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit) at Nashville’s famed RCA Studio A, the album marks Dawes’ first release on their new label, Rounder Records.

On the album, Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith grapples with the expectations of adulthood on a cycle of new songs fueled by many of the same elements that first earned the band worldwide attention and applause — graceful melodies with kinetic riffs and intricate musical interplay.

Throughout the album, Dawes push the “emotional limits” of the classically structured rock song. A culmination of their entire catalogue and decade-long career all wrapped up in nine tracks, Good Luck With Whatever reclaims the “rugged urgency” of the early albums while tapping into the veteran band’s intense musical connection more effectively than ever before.

“In the past, I’ve definitely been more precious about the way I wanted the songs to sound, but that’s never as fun,” Taylor Goldsmith says in a press release. “The music we make is everyone’s mode of expression, and the other guys all have chops that I don’t have and never will. The fact that we’re able to lean on each other and celebrate each other as individuals just makes us so much more excited about getting to play together in this band.”

Dawes also recently released Live From Richmond, VA, an 11-track concert recording available exclusively as a digital download via Bandcamp. All proceeds from those sales will be divided between Reform LA Jails and Black Lives Matter Los Angeles.

Photo credit: Clara Balzary