Today, acclaimed sister trio Call Me Spinster has announced their debut album Potholes, due out April 12 via Strolling Bones Records.
A timeless, genre-bending record, Potholes finds the band exploring the joys and challenges of relationships and motherhood. Along with the announcement, Call Me Spinster shares their new single “Feet Are Dirty,” a shimmering, dance-crying ode to the ups and downs of domestic life that arrives with a dreamy music video.
“The bulk of the songs on this album come from the very early phases of marriage and motherhood,” says Call Me Spinster’s Amelia Graber Jacobs. “One of the themes is the disorienting feeling of stumbling into the new, all-consuming identity of a domestic person. So much tiredness, so many endless piles of mundane tasks and minutiae and time standing still, but also technicolored joy. Feeling at once incredibly stuck and incredibly love-struck. 'Feet Are Dirty,' like several other songs on the album, is both a celebration of this moment, a mom-pop ode to Robyn and the '90s dance music we love, and a fantasy of escape to a more familiar version of ourselves.”
Self-produced alongside Drew Vandenberg (Faye Webster, of Montreal, Kishi Bashi) and recorded in the vaunted studios of Chase Park Transduction in Athens, Georgia, Potholes showcases the working rhythm of the three co-parenting sisters who make up Call Me Spinster. Throughout their debut album, the band writes about domestic life, the early days of marriage and motherhood. Sonically, Potholes boasts a wide range of influences from bubbly synth-pop to psychedelic folk and more, woven together with the trio’s deeply personal lyrics about the rollercoaster of this phase in life.
Potholes follows Call Me Spinster’s 2020 critically acclaimed self-titled EP, their first collection of songs which was also produced by Vandenberg and garnered widespread praise from Rolling Stone, American Songwriter, MXDWN and more. The inaugural release from Strolling Bones Records, the band’s eponymous EP introduced the world to their knack for blurring old-timey traditions and modernized pop fun without ever landing in expected territory.
Made up of sisters Amelia, Rachel and Rosie, Call Me Spinster harnesses the gift of blood harmony — a rare phenomenon available only to siblings who have grown up singing together. The group formed amidst the chaos of motherhood when Amelia became pregnant with her first child in 2017, which led to Rachel and Rosie quitting their respective teaching jobs and reuniting with their sister in Chattanooga. They began by tackling Prince and Drake covers on a hodgepodge of instruments — including their Amish grandfather’s old accordion, an upright bass, glockenspiel, and even the occasional pie pan — before applying their unorthodox arrangements to their own songs.
Amelia says, “Part of me wishes we’d started this project two decades ago. The learning curve seems nearly impossible sometimes - we’re running on fumes, always doing things partway. But I keep reminding myself - if we can learn to write songs, play some instruments, sing in front of people, the basics of sound engineering, all while birthing and raising young kids - I get really excited for what’s on the horizon. It feels like we’re just getting started.”
Learn more about Call Me Spinster on their website at www.spinsterband.com