MF Tomlinson releases a cover of Big Thief's "Mary"

Speaking to the beauty of what it means to be alive, this enrapturing, pristinely orchestrated new version of "Mary" was born from Tomlinson's "burning need to create an arrangement that was as big as it made me feel the first time I heard it. I felt it was echoing in a vast and unreal space, the belly of the whale, like being thrown around, carried away - set free, like smashing yourself apart with a sledgehammer.

"I first heard Big Thief's Mary whilst on tour with Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever," he continues. "Late night driving, hyperfocused on the road appearing and disappearing in the narrow headlights, I was swallowed up by the quiet and immense power of the piece - an enormous turning wheel of emotion that summons your earliest and most fundamental places. It just felt fucking huge and at the same time incredibly close and tender. That feeling never left me, and so here we are with this recording."

London-based, Brisbane/Meanjin-born singer-songwriter MF Tomlinson made his debut with the release of his Last Days Of Rome EP in 2020 and has since released two full length albums – 2021's Strange Time and its follow up and sister album, We Are Still Wild Horses in 2023.

MF Tomlinson plays Rough Trade East for PRAH Recordings' tenth Anniversary on 17 July.