Careful Announces New EP; Shares Lead Single “Promise”

Esteemed art-pop outfit Careful (the project of multi-instrumentalist/producer Eric Lindley) returns from a long hiatus (Eric became a father) with news of a new EP due in September. The news is accompanied by the lead single, “Promise,” which is out now!

Careful grew out of the cross-stream of art rock and concert music in LA, while Lindley studied with composer James Tenney by day and played bills with bands like Xiu Xiu, Mount Eerie, and Julia Holter by night. Live shows featured various collaborators over time, including Qasim Naqvi and Aakaash Israni of Dawn of Midi, Stephanie Richards (St. Vincent, David Byrne), and interdisciplinary artist Miwa Matreyek.

Careful’s first EP after almost a decade without releasing any new music, Promise / Practice is a meditation on loss. A parent loses a child to gun violence; an abuser loses their partner to their own cruelty and ignorance, people young and old process their sudden or eventual deaths. The songs are sometimes disarmingly bare, honest, and personal, sometimes playful, indirect or abstract, but always rooted in the fragility of our bodies and our relationships.

Sonically, the release, on the whole, aspires to the kind of emotional art-pop played by acts like Mitski, Perfume Genius, Sufjan Stevens, and Holly Herndon, while each track has its own unique inflection, drawing inspiration at times from the colourful harmonies and textures of Maurice Ravel, the degraded electronic noise of Crystal Castles, and intimacy of Elliot Smith.

The songs were written, recorded, and produced by Eric Lindley.