Zoh Amba – Dead End Street
We covered Eyes Full (W19) when it was still incoming; it’s out now on Matador Records, and “Dead End Street” is its third single. Where the title track showed the quieter, more suspended side of the record, this one is the opposite: feedback-singed, snarling, the kind of track the source material describes as not allowing much space for anything else. The video was directed by Amba and Liz Layton.
Everything that made the album worth paying attention to is present here in compressed form: the live tracking at Drop of Sun Studios in Asheville with no overdubs, Kevin Hyland on electric guitar and Jim White on drums, Amba playing rhythm while Hyland plays lead, the two weaving around each other. The rawness isn’t an aesthetic choice so much as a method. They rehearsed together all day every day before recording, and you can hear what that builds: a band that knows exactly when to push and when to pull back, and on “Dead End Street” they mostly push.
Amba comes from Kingsport, Tennessee, and Eyes Full is explicitly a record about small-town working-class life, about people who go unseen. The title fits that frame: a dead end street isn’t a metaphor so much as a literal address for a particular kind of life. That specificity is what the album does well, and this track carries it.
Tour Dates:
North America
- Jun. 27 / Spring Creek, NC / Lightning Bug Festival
- Aug. 11 / Cleveland, OH / Agora Theater & Ballroom (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 12 / McKees Rocks, PA / Roxian Theatre (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 14 / Cincinnati, OH / MegaCorp Pavilion (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 15 / Kansas City, MO / The Truman (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 19 / Portland, OR / Pioneer Courthouse Square (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 21 / Denver, CO / Mission Ballroom (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 22 / Salt Lake City, UT / The Complex (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 24 / Sacramento, CA / Channel 24 (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 26 / San Francisco, CA / The Fillmore (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 27 / San Francisco, CA / The Fillmore (with Courtney Barnett)
- Aug. 29 / Los Angeles, CA / Hollywood Palladium (with Courtney Barnett)
- Sep. 1 / Los Angeles, CA / Zebulon
- Sep. 2 / San Francisco, CA / Cafe Du Nord
- Sep. 4 / Portland, OR / Show Bar
- Sep. 5 / Vancouver, BC / Fox Cabaret
- Sep. 9 / Seattle, WA / Barboza
Europe
- Oct. 29 / Vendôme, FR / Rockomotives Festival
- Oct. 30 / Paris, FR / La Boule Noire (Les Femmes S’en Mêlent)
- Oct. 31 / Amsterdam, NL / London Calling Festival
- Nov. 2 / Hamburg, DE / Aalhaus
- Nov. 3 / Berlin, DE / Kantine am Berghain
- Nov. 5 / Brussels, BE / Botanique
- Nov. 6 / Den Haag, NL / Crossing Border Festival
- Nov. 7 / Groningen, NL / TakeRoot Festival
- Nov. 8 / Kortrijk, BE / Sonic City Festival
- Nov. 10 / Amiens, FR / La Lune des Pirates
UK
- Nov. 12 / Bristol, UK / The Louisiana
- Nov. 13 / London, UK / The Lexington
- Nov. 14 / Manchester, UK / Gullivers
- Nov. 15 / Glasgow, UK / The Hug and Pint
