Lambchop announce new album Showtunes with opening track "A Chef's Kiss"

"A Chef's Kiss" is the first release from Lambchop in 2021, following last year's TRIP covers album.

Kurt Wagner says of the album opener, "The track is a reflection on the temporal nature of life and ultimately of song itself. A "chef’s kiss", being a gesture toward something perfected or well done, even loved."

In 2019, Wagner experimented with converting guitar tracks into midi piano tracks. Wagner says, "Suddenly I discovered I could "play" the piano. It was a revelation that from those conversions I was able to manipulate each note and add, subtract, arrange the chords and melody into a form that didn’t have any of the limitations I had with my previous methods of writing with a guitar."

He continues, "In general, it’s a genre I was none too fond of, with the exceptions of a few Great American Songbook type of stuff or some of the works of artists like Tom Waits or early Randy Newman or even Gershwin or Carmichael. I’d always wanted to make songs with a similar feel but my skills were limited until now."

For Showtunes, Wagner recruited CJ Camerieri on horns, Yo La Tengo's James McNew on upright bass, and Grammy Award-winner Jeremy Ferguson as a co-producer.

Wagner states, "One of the things that holds Lambchop together, what binds us, is that we are friends with similar likes and an appreciation and respect for what each other does. It’s what has kept this band evolving through time and now the door has reopened, the group, has just gotten larger with its members free to come and go. To be a part of the music as the songs and their interest might allow. Just like in the beginning."

Tracklist:

1. A Chef's Kiss
2. Drop C
3. Papa Was A Rolling Stone Journalist
4. Fuku
5. Unknown Man
6. Blue Leo
7. Impossible Meatballs
8. The Last Benedict