Sling Shot To Heaven (Director's Cut) - Silver

Recording Sling Shot To Heaven was beautiful experience. A specific type of melancholy had set in and I had written a collection of songs that felt new, something specific to me that I’d spent the whole Margot project fumbling around for. When we finished I spent a night listening to it. I suddenly felt a sincere urge to take this new little Margot group to a proper studio to re-record it. I had this sound in my head and it seemed like what we had just made was the blueprint for a slightly different approach. I called Heidi about it. I called a couple studios in Nashville about it. I worked on a new track list and plans to get the money together to do it. We shot “Tell Me More About Evil”, the SSTH film. Then I got very sick, almost died, and moved on to writing (and eventually recording twice) what became “Lemon Cotton Candy Sunset” and “Verdugo”.

In many ways, SSTH always felt more like the first solo record than the last Margot record. Maybe it falls somewhere in between. But I always felt a little guilty that I was unable to follow through on my plan. When I began working with Dave Palmer I started to hear the sound again. I could hear what I had in mind for “Sling Shot To Heaven”. During covid we began recording new versions of some Nukes songs, including many from Sling Shot. I didn’t say it out loud but it was a sort of test run to see if that old plan of mine had any validity in the real world. The results were what I had hoped for. Some of those recordings have been heard by those of you have listened to the now out of print Margot in quarantine LP’s. Directly following surgery we reunited in the studio to complete the “Sling Shot To Heaven” project.

I know that re-recording things is complicated. People are often, understandably, married to that first thing they heard. But I hope a decent amount of people will be able to time travel back to an imaginary place where I was never sick and SSTH sounded like this and was the first solo record. Put it on and then put on “Lemon Cotton Candy Sunset” if you’re so inclined. I think it makes sense.

I love this album. It’s about a slow simmering grief, missing home, dreaming of past lives, absconding with imaginary sisters, heading West, love starting to sting. My little pile of silly life’s work certainly seems more complete now that it is entering the world. Listen loud.