Wilder Maker

Wilder Maker, Dida Pelled, Jackie West at Union Pool. 

Wilder Maker

• After a series of self-releases and home recordings, Brooklyn's Wilder Maker came to national attention via their Saddle Creek 7” New Streets in 2017 and released their label debut Zion with Northern Spy Records in 2018, receiving praise from Stereogum, Vice, Fader, and Pitchfork along the way. Ask songwriter Gabriel Birnbaum what inspired Male Models – the band's diverse new album – and he’ll mention everything from American novelist James Salter and the NBA playoffs to Thin Lizzy and the delicate tightrope of positive masculinity. Together these references points provide some insight into the creation of an album that somehow succeeds at being both an apocalyptic novel of ideas and the most cohesive party playlist that you’ve ever heard. The music of Male Models was recorded live over several days with a core band that consisted of Birnbaum and longtime collaborators Nick Jost and Sean Mullins. Despite his role as frontman and principal songwriter, Birnbaum’s voice can only be heard singing lead on seven of the twelve songs. The remaining tracks have guests taking the mic, unveiling an impressive lineup that includes Counting Crows Adam Duritz, Katie Von Schleicher, and Jordan Lee (aka Mutual Benefit). Like guests at a strange afterparty, when you hear these accomplished vocalists recount Birnbaum’s tales of unrequited love, drunkenness, and desperation, it feels almost voyeuristic, as if you were sitting in a crowded cocktail bar, sneaking glances at nearby tables.

Dida Pelled

• Brooklyn-based, Native Tel-Avivian, Dida Pelled, is widely regarded as the greatest jazz guitarist this side of the Mississippi. Pelled’s ambitions took shape as a child, when, entranced by bebop, she sequestered herself from the world and resolved to master guitar, later earning a spot in the Israeli Army band before training at the New School on a scholarship to study jazz. She quickly made a name for herself in the New York jazz scene, recording with Jazz masters like Roy Hargrove and Gregory Hutchinson and touring the world. As her jazz star rose, Pelled felt a pull toward classic American songwriting, shifting her direction and redefining her voice. Love of the Tiger, Pelled’s new album, is the product of a jazz prodigy gone rogue, it's a love letter to the obscure, weaving across genres, twisting and turning with Pelled’s ever-expanding range of musical abilities and interests.
  

Jackie West 

• Jackie got to know a community of folk musicians one summer taking care of horses on Martha’s Vineyard and began learning and writing music on an old acoustic guitar she borrowed. From there she moved to Brooklyn, where she began to sing Jazz at a weekly residency while starting a project with her long time friend (Emily Gasda) which led to an invitation to travel to Paris to record with Lewis Lazar (Oracle Sisters) on his reel to reel in Montmartre producing an EP titled ‘Ivansencha’. After this adventure, Jackie West returned to New York and began writing songs prolifically on her own, all the while developing as a jazz singer by trade in the corners of Brooklyn and Manhattan’s speakeasies and bars. Teaming up with producer Jon Wiley, these songs resulted in what is her debut EP self titled ‘Jackie West’ released with Westernesse in 2022. 
The self-titled three song EP features a number of friends performing in a mixed style of remote and live recording. West’s otherwise minimal, acoustic songs turn into multi-instrumental soundscapes, drawing new dimensions from her world.