In a move that is sure to delight the legions of hungry music fans who are currently stuck indoors, Durham, NC’s beloved electropop duo (Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn) Sylvan Esso has announced they will be releasing a brand new, hour-long concert film straight to YouTube this coming week. Titled WITH, the film captures “a magical, lightning in a bottle moment int he group’s history and celebrates one of the duo’s core tenets: community.”
The concert film was recorded during a limited engagement tour in the fall of 2019, when Sylvan Esso was touring with an unusually robust group of backing musicians. These friends of the band included members of numerous famed groups, from Bon Iver and Wye Oak to Mountain Man, Hiss Golden Messenger, Mandolin Orange, Hand Habits and Mr. Twin Sister. Together, they came together to form something greater than the sum of their parts, culminating in two sold-out hometown shows at the Durham, NC Performing Arts Center, where the concert film was captured. You can see just a hint of the fun to come in the trailer below. The film debuts at 9 p.m., April 23 as a YouTube premiere, with more information available at the official website.
Describing the film, the band says the following:
“We knew that in order to put on the best show we possibly could in a few short weeks we had to truly lean on and trust the friends we had asked to become part of our band. The end result—as with so many communal efforts—was much greater than the sum of its parts, in ways we could have never dreamed of. The world has completely shifted in a few months—the idea of togetherness rings in a different way. It was such a special moment that now feels like a signpost of how things were and how they could be again.”
We at Paste have of course been fans of Sylvan Esso for a long time at this point, naming their 2014 song “Hey Mami” as the #1 song of the year and placing them on numerous “best live act” and album of the year lists. As a live force with few equals, we agree wholeheartedly that a Sylvan Esso concert film is exactly what we’re needing right about now.
